More of the same this week: Ukraine has intensified its drone campaign to carry out some headline-grabbing strike or terror stunt to manage media perceptions and keep themselves looking viable and relevant.
Well technically Russia already attacked NATO by destroying their $200 million dollar MQ-9 Reaper drone over Crimea. I don't recall NATO having much of an answer to that, other than mouse-like squeaking noises.
You mean the flying trash can (aka f35) boondoggle. It would have to rank with GM's Corvair. If you care to check the GAO's November 2022 report they conclude that "Weapon System Sustainment Aircraft Mission Capable Goals Were Generally Not Met and Sustainment Costs Varied by Aircraft." Maintenance seems an increasing issue for US services including the USN.
Hmm, Let's see ... How about we start with the Air Force, shall we?
F15's? From the 70s
F16s? From the 70s
F18s? From the 70s
B52s? From the 50s
B1s? From the 70s
A10s? From the 70s
That accounts for almost the entire US combat aircraft inventory, as there are only about 16 B2's, the F35s are still not (fully) operational and not combat capable (nor will they ever be), and the relatively small number of F22s are already slated to be withdrawn from service (well before the aircraft they were supposed to replace).
How about the navy's ships?
Arleigh Burke destroyers? From the 80s
Nimitz carriers? From the 70s
Ohio-class submarines? From the 70s
Los Angeles-class submarines? From the 70s
Ticonderoga cruisers? From the 80s
Wasp amphibious assault ships? From the 80s
That's the bulk of the combat ships they have accounted for, unless of course you want to count those Littoral bathtubs as 'combat' ships.
It's no better with the Army by the way, the US armed forces rely on weaponry dating back to the 70s and 80s. Soviet-era, I believe that is popularly called.
And you know what's even better? Most of the systems developed to replace them have failed, often spectacularly. For most of those I listed above, there is effectively nothing (affordable) in the pipeline to replace them with in future.
So basically, the last time the US was able to build effective hardware was the 70s/80s. Considering that our economic & cultural decay began gaining momentum around 1971, and it would take another 20 years or so for the old guard to retire, the time-frames add up quite well. Also, I read that alot of the cutting edge Russian tech you're seeing now (loitering munitions, hypersonic missiles, glide bombs, etc) was developed by the US back in that era, then completely neglected.
"the last time the US was able to build effective hardware was the 70s/80s"
One small addition there needed: 'COST-effective'. Some of the replacement systems that failed did so not because of performance failures of the design, but because the cost-to-benefit ratio was way out of proportion and did not justify its continuation.
The B2 and F22 are also examples of this wildly out of whack cost-to-performance ratio, they do have utility, but nowhere enough to justify their enormous costs (both for acquisition and operational costs). But due to the massive political capital invested in those programs (and greasing the right pockets), they were allowed to continue.
My father was USAF in that time period. Piloted B-52s for SAC. Slept in wooden barracks by the runway, if the alarm went off it meant the russkies planes were on their way over the North Pole. They had 15 minutes to get six eight engine bombers off of one runway and on their way to bounce the rubble.
He later worked on A-10 and B-1. Basically, the USAF went to shit and forgot how to build planes when he retired....
So, basically, the premise that boomers are bloated, overindulged, and useless parasites is correct. They were given a paradise of advanced technology, overwhelming wealth, and unsurpassed productivity and they pissed it away on Jimmy Buffet tapes, luxury cruises, and silver RVs.
That's an important qualification, thanks. This ties into another issue, which is that larger military budgets do not necessarily translate into greater strength -- it could just mean there's more corruption, waste & inefficiency.
Do you think the John you replied to is a real person, a propaganda operative, or a bot?
I know a large majority of people are morons but this so called 'John' is living in a fantasy land that is so preposterous it's not even funny anymore.
It must be tiresome having to respond to ludicrous statements like the above.
Well you made me curious so I checked his post history. He has a comment from May of this year which states:
"The west will soon launch a massive strike to drive Russia out of Ukraine and decimate their forces."
Well, you gotta hand it to him, at least he's sticking to his predictions. Though the repeated re-use of the word "soon" half a year apart is a little questionable.
"Soon" is a somewhat fuzzy term. Reminds me of one of Mark Twain's travelling reports. He had read that glaciers drift into the valley and tried to use one, in the Alps as I recall it, as a means of public transportation. He became impatient long before reaching his destination and was mildly upset with the source of information he had relied on. ;-)
just as soon as they train up all the retarded guys they are mobilizing, poor bastards . ukroids even made a new category of "combat capable " to stop the families of these mentally challenged guys from contesting their mobilization. its over when ya gotta go that low
While I am sympathetic to Russia - it is difficult to ignore some of the more blatant happening ons in this war - as I have mentioned in other replies to this article I find it strange that Russia has not given Western leaders a good scaring with missile strikes on their positions when visiting Ukraine - I cant imagine Stalin during WW2 allowing Nazi officials to stroll around near Soviet lines and not at least try to assassinate or blow them up. I am sure they had some talking with the good ole "Western Partners" and were "asked" to not fire. But when Russia is sanctioned and treated like a pariah by them, acquiescing to Western demands is weakness. The West understands only the language of strength, any attempt at being "held back" (задержанный - if you speak Russian) is viewed as weakness. Next is the fact that Russia allows the rada to meet and pass ever more anti-Russian draconian laws without multiple missile strikes of the Rada to paralyze Ukraines government. Why was Zelensky able to visit Izyum, all while being within artillery range? Why is Ukraine not being flattened as Dresden was during WW2? While I am Ukrainian born and appreciate Russia trying to be "humane" at the start of this conflict, now this does not matter - Ukrainians will still blame and hate Russia regardless of what they do, so might as well end it fast and painlessly and show other nations that it is not worth messing with it (this woukd be a clear message for Kazakhstan, as this war will repeat with Kazakhstan in 20 years). Finally, Ukraine keeps talking about "rebuilding" and making deals in this regard as if its victory is a foregone conclusion, perhaps it knows something we do not? If one is to read Russian language accounts of soldiers, both sides agree on one thing - this whole thing is a договорняк (agreement).
The way we should view this conflict is through the lens of "WWSD" - "What Would Stalin Do" to find the answers
Point is (abd like you yourself said), there have been many strange twists during this war - Russian elites making a deal with the West may be one such twist.
1. Russia has pointedly not declared war, nor has any NATO country declared war on Russia. so while the SMO is defacto a war, and everyone (except Russian leaders) calls it a war, there a actions which cannot be taken unless at war... both in terms of Russian constitution and international law, which Russia tries to uphold.
2. Russia has made it clear that it is not targeting, nor intends to target, civilians. Attacking either Ukrainian or other nations' politicians would mean targeting civilians.
And if that came from Estonia, it is most definitely not meaningless either.
That is a probing action to see if Putin will not react to attacks from NATO territory.
Given the non-stop displays of pathetic weakness and outright treason since March 2022, there is a high chance the Kremlin will once again prefer to pretend nothing happened, which will only invite further such strikes.
Sure in a vacuum it's not meaningless, but in the context of the hostilities, i.e. compared against what Ukraine is losing on a daily basis, it is quite meaningless. Particularly given the fact that the planes and airfield don't have any utility for the SMO.
If they came from Estonia then of course that's a gigantic deal, but most likely they didn't though we can't discount anything.
It very much looks like they came from Estonia, but let's look at all the possibilities:
1) If they came from Estonia and the Kremlin just swallows it once again, that opens up Russia for attacks from NATO territory. Or from the sea. Obvious next target is Olenya and the Tu-95s. If the IL-76 isn't a huge deal, those very much are.
2) If it came from Latvia through Poland and Lithuania, same thing.
3) If it came from Sumy/Chernigov and Russia didn't even detect them (21 2-stroke engine drones!!!), then once again, one by one strategic assets will be taken out with impunity, unless finally the Kiev regime is dealt with decisively.
The only safe places will be area immediately behind the Urals. Not even the Far East -- they will be launching drones from "commercial" ships.
But the Kremlin is still in "we want a deal so that our oligarchs can be again accepted as part of the club in Courchevel" mode and there is no prospect for that happening any time soon if past performance continues to be the most reliable predictor of future actions.
1a. No confirmation or even any evidence these attacks originated in NATO territory. Already given is a very reasonable explanation of how these attacks likely originated from Russian territory. The burden of proof is on you as your claim is the least likely and you have given zero evidence.
1b. You assume that the Tu-95 bases, which are used in the SMO and are much more valuable assets, are poorly defended like the IL-76s. Dyagilevo and Engels air bases are also much deeper inside Russia and thus much more difficult to get to in the strictly physical sense.
2. See above.
3. 3% of Russia's heavy lift capacity subjected to minor/moderate damage in an operation that took months to plan and coordinate is hardly "strategic assets" being "taken out with impunity." The last event like this was months ago. I doubt that Russia's strategic capabilities will be in any way effected by tiny, exceptionally difficult to plan and execute attacks that occur months apart. This while Russia strikes Ukraine's strategic depths with dozens of missiles, bombs, and drones on a daily and nightly basis.
In summation: your insane extrapolations from a singular data point are just that: insane extrapolations from a single data point.
A very alarming trend of meaningless, minor losses. Putin will surrender any day now and NATO will break up Russia into tiny, exploitable fragments. QED.
There's a trend here. NATO is adapting within the parameters of the SMO. Pretty much NATO is still well contained in their involvement. They still couldn't do the shooting. It is still Ukraine who are still conducting the ground war. I fear the day when it is an all out war against NATO.
If the mentioned cardboard drones have been used it would be helpful to know some technical details. Especially, are they made of your everyday "raw" cardboard? If the cardboard isn't sealed against humidity I very much doubt they are able to fly for hours during the night, even if it didn't rain. I guess one would have to know about the dew point along a possible rout. Whatever, just a thought about the survivability of such a thing in this climate and at night.
If as Simplicius suggests, they were launched within < 5 km of the destination, air moisture would not matter. The other benefit is that there would be almost no trace of the weapon after detonation.
The question I have about the cardboard drone hypothesis is how much explosive payload could a cardboard drone possibly carry?
I find it hard to believe that MI6 spent months planning an operation with Ukrainian operatives inside Russia who could be caught at any time. That MI6 would spend months planning an operation inside Estonia seems more likely to me.
Saw a military analysis by that Austrian guy recently and he was also predicting ukr attacks on strategic assets. I think the unintended consequence is simply that Russia begins ramping up manufacturing of strategic assets. Whereas NATO will not.
Pre the offensive Reisner predicted a wave of attacks like this intended to distract attention and sow confusion. I have not seen his latest piece mentioned in the article but in the previous one he detailed all the defences. Then he proceeded to show the projected lines of UAF advance as if they did not exist. His first reports were pretty good. Subsequent ones indicate to me he has been "ordered" to comply with the standard approved western narrative.
So he's been drinking the western kool schnapps? Someone's been feeding him porkie schnitzels? Has someone been whispering in his ear and dropping letters in his lederhosen? A vendetta in Vienna? This is high drama my friend.
Indeed. To add to what you daid ' Ukraine keeps making "deals" with various Western countries about "rebuilding" "after the war", as if its victory is assured. If theres one thing we know, is that if Ukraine keeps announcing something it ends up happening. Perhaps theres a deal with Russia putting on a show but ultimately allowing its self to lose in return for Western concessions? This would explain much of the stranger stuff going on in the SMO - like no flattening of Ukraine (at this point the Ukrainian population is so brainwashed that it matters not if you fight humanely or flatten Ukraine America style - you will stoll be accused of warcrimes), no targetting of Zelensky, somehow the attacks on BOTH Zaluzhny and Budanov both failing, etc.
The mighty Nato has literally been relegated to staging covert terror attacks through its almost completely destroyed Nazi proxy, on non-strategic non-hardened targets, with cardboard drones. Enough said. I'm sure not even the Taliban are impressed. And do you really think Russia hasn't retaliated to all these attacks? What's happening in Africa is an absolute nightmare for the West. That's not a coincidence. Nato wants Russia to act aggressive and attack another country so they can get more countries on the sanctions ship. Nato wouldn't even fight Iraq or Afghanistan without first completely isolating them. It has refused to go to war with Iran even though it's been sanctioning it since the 80's. It is beyond the realm of possibility that they would ever go to war with Russia, especially with China not only on its side, but literally next door. When even a blind guy locked in a cave can see you're getting stronger while your enemy is getting weaker and more desperate by the day, the last thing you want to do is give up the initiative by overreacting to what is essentially a couple minor casualties of war. As long as Russia doesn't give the West an excuse to put its MIC on a war footing or start taking heavy casualties, I don't see why they would be in any hurry. The longer they drag this conflict out, the deeper the West digs it's own grave.
What's been happening in Africa is an absolute nightmare for FRANCE. Together with the decapitation of Wagner, the US is doing really well in Africa, controlling more and more governments directly.
It is an escalation, a "provocation." The US military wants to fight an insurrection/ guerrilla style war against Russia that beat them in Vietnam and Afghanistan. They didn't expect a SMO this scale. Suicide drone attacks with low radar signatures are going to continue to ramp up and be a problem. Russia will be seeing swarms. I thought they could stop them with electronic means, but you have to detect them to take them out.
Hi, I have been monitoring a Telegram site called Baltic Antifascists. They report that a huge military exercise was scheduled at the border across from the attack site on the night of the attack. They also heard a lot of aircraft flying overhead. The article suggested that some of the aircraft may have been drones, but it did not prove that. The people on the Telegram site are convinced that they attack came from Estonia.
One of these days Ukraine is going to hit something such as an Apartment block or Shopping mall where you may see hundreds killed. If I were the Ukrainian MOD I would make certain that the attack came from a NATO country so there is no ambiguity.
There are a lot of people in Russia and around the world who feel the same way as GM, including Prig and Wagner. Think it isn't a problem for Putin? The right staged an insurrection. There is some danger to Putin from the right. There are people in Russia who want Putin to use the nuke to show he will. They see his weakness as encouraging escalation by the West because they think "Putin is bluffing." That's John Bolton telling you directly.
Actually, strategy demands Putin plays game this way, way of SMO.
Each escalation is in a way starting a new war and side that escalates takes responsibility for the result, before its own citizens.
The current result is US/West pushing Ukrainians into death without chance for victory.
Putin will not miss the chance to hit hard and succeed when moment comes.
War is assymetric, development unstable, Ukraine’s logistical, manpower demands rising, willingness to support, number of recruitable men falling...
Putin is waiting for the culmination, point of exhaustion.
And then, between the first serious US offer at negotiations and a final collapse of defence is the time for real counteroffensive, when wins will be big and irreversible and casualties low.
but responding the way you want means almost certainly all out war with the whole of NATO.
Maybe you think that's okay. Maybe you think it is inevitable. Alright. But then wouldn't you do it at a time of your own choosing if it's going to be done? And in a way of your own devising?
What next? Just keep taking hits to strategic assets? This isn't the USSR, it is the greatly diminished Russia which has long been on the very edge of sufficiency in terms of those thing.
P.S. Estonia and Latvia won't be nuked because they are a 30% and 40% Russian, respectively. But if Russia does a strategic strike against Poland and wipes it out completely, there will be no all-out war. That will be the end of it, because lethal intent will have been demonstrated in the most unmistakable way. Nobody will sacrifice DC for Warsaw. And the whole NATO bluff will be called.
The real problem is that this will give the US the excuse to solve its own problems around the world the same way. And if there is a way to deal with the current situation without opening that Pandora box, then indeed, it should be avoided. But those options are rapidly running out.
Another option is completely take Ukraine including Western Ukraine but that is precisely the type of escalation the west is trying to provoke. Besides Russia isnt going to start ww3 over some potential drones that probably came from within russia. Thats just crazy talk.
You have no evidence that NATO is "directly attacking". Stavka will have a pretty clear idea of the facts here, if not now, within a few days. I would expect any reaction to be based on those facts, proportionate, in line with their overall strategic objectives (ie no distractions) and taken with a view to avoid WW3 and in their own good time.
"NATO is now directly attacking." You keep saying this. But you have yet to show even a shred of proof for this blind assertion. Of course, NATO has been pretty directly involved from day 1 in that NATO officers have been commanding Uke units (tons of reports of orders in English being broadcast over tactical nets) and even barely avoiding capture in Azovstal. The springtime incursions in the Belgorod region seemed to have been led by NATO special forces soldiers. NATO ISR has designated targets for the Ukes from the beginning. There is no "trend" in NATO involvement; it has stayed pretty static from the get go and if there is a trend, it is that NATO is actually cutting back its involvement as it has virtually nothing of value left to send.
You seem to think that Russia is afraid of calling NATO's bluff but the opposite seems true. Russia destroyed that Global Hawk drone over the Black Sea. Russia has had no problem sending Kinzhal missiles into gatherings of NATO officers inside of Ukraine and seems to have killed at least several hundred of them so far.
Big Serge has a term for people like you: Schizopatriot.
Words today are on the edge of meaningless but we still must try.
'NATO' is not attacking. The US is using NATO to attack Russia. It is using Kiev to attack Russia. It is using everything and anything to attack Russia.
But because of the apathy of the masses etc. that is NOT 'NATO'.
And those apathetic masses in Poland, men women and children, do not deserve to be 'nuked' and should not be and contemplating such courses of action was a hallmark of the utter insanity of Zelensky.
This is insanity! You assert that a nation can "nuke" an entire (deserving-in-your-thinking) people off the face of the earth, simply, without any reaction, without any pause, and then assert that the rest of the world will do nothing about it, because in your estimation, they just won't.
You are living in a fantasy geo-political world of your own mind; clearly mega-maniacal. Standing way to close to your emotions.
To think there are people out there who wouldn't stoop that low is just being naive. These people control by fear and the masses dance to their tune.... even you. It might not be a nation but these "people" will destroy civilizations just to be "right" Yea sure it might not be nuclear, my guess it will be "biological". and "they" DO have the control.
Migram experiment is one example of the mind of the masses.
Humans have become weak minded controlled by hate fear etc., by living in this "cage of society" with everything handed to them on a bloody "silver platter."
Everyone is a slave to this " system"... A system of "throw away lives" with no regards with the miracle of life itself.
Putin is a white man and white men are nice .... until they aren't. When the time is right Russia will settle its scores with the Baltic "nations" including Finland and all will simply cease to exist. They had their chance to shine and stand up to US bullying but the women running their "nations" and pretending to be as tough as real men bowed down to that bullying exactly the way a real man would never do.
And what if the attack did not come from NATO territory? Or came from NATO territory without the knowledge of the local government, launched secretly by Ukraine or the CIA (or, realistically, both)? As long as they have plausible deniability, any Russian response would be portrayed as a casus belli.
I just did a voiceover for SouthFrong. 4x IL76 not "lost" but damaged. How much is the question. The Baltics are very close.The targeted airport is located almost 700 km from the border with Ukraine. While the distance from Pskov to the Latvian border is about 65 kilometers. Not Estonia but Latvia.. The Ukraianians insist that this was a RUSSIAN group -- inside Russia. Don't believe everything you read. The Wagner Crash is a good exmple. This incident another.
I agree. Nato keeps crossing these red lines because Russia doesn't ever retaliate. These repeated drone strikes on crimea and elsewhere are embarrassing for Russia, imo
But whenver they do it, you seem it as: "They should have done this anyway!"
Ask yourself: Why were Western leaders traveling in and out of Ukraine the last year almost weekly, but this year they seem to be pussies and don't dare it?
Why did the West accept it when Russia just striked on the Romanian border which also hit Romanian assets?
All I know is ukraine hits Russia weekly not monthy. They have hit the crimean bridge, crimea ammo storages, airfields, etc with drones recently. Crimea was supposed to be a red line yet it'd been hit multiple times the past month
Yes, yes, but to what result? It's like some kid throwing rocks at your windows. A nuisance for sure, but that's basically all it is. Meanwhile, losing yet another army of materiel and "meat" while Russia continues to stockpile weapons and men.
And they retaliated to their little attacks on Crimea and stopped the grain deal and bombed their grain silos even on the Romanian border!
They lost 20 billion USD per year in retaliation for something that is barely an inconvenience for the Russian army.
And the strike on this airfield makes no difference in the war whatsoever. Its a broken country that is lashing out via terror attacks. They don't achieve anything.
I rather have them do those twitter stunts for media points, than have them actually have some military success.
Hell, the last military success they had is now more than 10 months in the past.
The question is why did Russia not target Western leaders and give them quite a scare? Nothing will make them look as bad. The Russians even let Zelensky enter Izyum to within Artillery range and did nothing!
Are you seriously asking the question why Russia didn't assassinate Western leaders? Remember that most of them asked for allowance before traveling there.
Yes I am seriously asking this question - can you imagine Stalin allowing Nazi officials to visit any conquered territory near the front lines and not try to assassinate or blow them up with a 155 mm shell, during WW2? If Stalin had missiles, you can rest assured that he'd be constantly firing them on the Budenstag and blowing up as many Nazi Officials as possible.
Then there is the question of all of the Nato Analysts working in Ukraine that Simplicus mentions in his ISR article - why are they allowed to operate with impunity?
The conventional wisdom right now is this was done INSIDE Russia and not from the Baltic states. Out of ALL the airfields in Russia, that they pick one not related to the SMO (ie Engels) or other high value assets that they could have picked speaks volumes of their inability to hit those Russian targets. How many IL-76 does Russia have? I thought it was 400+ plus another 20 on order this year (I might be off but something in that ballpark). 2 lightly damaged and 2 badly damaged. Again this might change, but thats what I heard so far.
1) building fortified hangars for all planes valuable enough
2) complete jamming of all radiocommunication frequencies of all airbases
3) sitch to sound based detectors. Instead of trying to find the drones on radar, develop sound/electro-optical detection systems for drones. You can install EW moduls with sound and electro-optical sensors around the parked aircraft, like some sort of a CIWS system. When they "hear" or "see" a drone, they fry it. Those anti-drone moduls are already starting to come online for tanks.
It would be very clever of the Russians to keep mentioning the "drones from Estonia" angle. They should be very explicit about it and repeat the accusation every chance they get. In the end, Russia is going to have to confront Nato and Estonia is a natural target if Russia is going to avoid being denied access to the Baltic Sea.
In today’s interview Tucker Carlson stated that he would bet his house that Biden bipartisan War clique will start hot war with Russia -- that they have no longer other choice against Trump but to use War Act
Tucker Carlson on His Interview with Trump, FOX Firing & America's Future
I saw that earlier this evening. It was a good interview, disturbing and truthful on many levels, but a good interview. The crazies are in charge and it scares the hell out of me what they will do. Even worse is there is zero of anyone to be a leader in the wings, they are all part of "Permanent Washington" as Tucker calls it. They are senile, stupid and clueless, NWO freaks, or just lazy sacks of shit that will do whatever to keep their seat at the trough.
CIA/Nazis and Zionist Jews are the two leading parasites and predators to mankind. They have a natural alliance with Ukraine… bit a quick search of history will reveal genocide, culling of their own people (deplorable whites and ghetto Jews),mass genetic changing injections, and now transhumanism. All the money from the Jewish Banking Mafia and all the political might is not the end goal - creating their own Frankenstein population must be quite exhiliarating.
Not sure how much I trust Tucker at this point. His main objection to the war against Russia is that it is not a war against China. He's pushing for a hot war, just not with Russia.
Yeah, he doesn't talk about China in this particular interview, but nearly everything else he does he promotes "muh Chinese are our mortal enemies." He promoted that utterly asinine "chinese spy balloon" nonsense. He constantly talks about how the current administration is "soft" on China when in reality the Biden admin has been the biggest anti-China hawks since, well, ever.
His rationale for making peace with Russia makes sense if you approach Americas rivalry with China from a strategic standpoint - end the war with Russia, give them Ukraine in return for concessions vis a vis China, who is currently the bigger threeat to the US anyways
Tucker Carlson is a propagandist for the MAGA/Trumptard wing of the American Empire, which favors war against China--as opposed to war against Russia. Carlson is the conservative doppelganger of Rachel Maddow, who is a propagandist for the Democrat/Libtard wing of the American Empire and favors the opposite.
The fact that this media clown is pimped by some people as an "antiwar" voice shows how militaristic America truly is.
There is no principled antiwar opposition of political significance in the USA. The only political distinctions in the US are debates about *which* country America should prepare to wage war against.
Thus, Donald Trump is always running his mouth about how he "didn't start any new wars," but he covers up how he escalated America's not-so-covert hybrid wars against Iran, Venezuela, China, or the proxy war against Russia in Syria.
Trump is just the White conservative version of Barack Obama, who disingenuously opposed the "dumb" US war against Iraq--only because he wanted to wage smart US wars against Libya, Syria, etc.
There are no "good guys" within the American corporate/political oligarchy, media, or national security state.
They are all war criminals.
They Dupe People Into Debating War With Russia Vs War With China, Instead Of War Itself
Simplicius - can you comment on the Rabotino situation in a bit more detail? I know it is fluid, but Rabotino being "gray" zone vs. a temporary Ukraine presence vs. a partial Russian presence, etc is somewhat important. Also the talk about taking Tokmak.
As for mobilization: it is far from clear to me what good this would do. Unless the West empties out its armories even more - i.e. going into active reserve as opposed to inactive reserve or even less ready platforms - what exactly will these 200K, 300K, 500K additional Ukrainian soldiers have in terms of gear? AKs with a single clip each?
One of the reasons it's unclear is because Ukraine, as per their job, is doing a lot of deliberate smokescreen propaganda to confuse the issue as much as possible. They did the same in Staromayorsk and elsewhere where a small DRG team went in to hang a flag then retreated. They took a video of themselves hanging a flag in the center of Rabotino but quickly ran away. They hoped this would convince the world Rabotino is theirs, but Russian sources continue to deny that it's taken.
The fact is, it is "fluid" as you say. Meaning, on a daily basis they have troops that enter it then are hit with artillery and retreat. So depending on the time of day the answer is different but they certainly don't hold or occupy it. Also, Russian troops continue launching similar assaults from the south of it. They enter from the south, work their way up toward the middle, then retreat once UA starts shelling or launching recon/FPV drones, etc.
This is a tactic to keep both sides "on their toes", in a sense 'active defense', an attempt to keep the opposing side from trying to come into the town. Most maps don't show this because most maps simply give up on trying to depict 'gray zones' and only show colors for complete control so once Russia retreated they defaulted to showing Rabotino as mostly Ukrainian controlled colors.
Now it appears UA has taken so many losses trying to take Rabotino they gave up and are reorienting everything toward what they perceive as the Verbove "breakthrough".
Yes Tokmak has become their truncated goal, as I think I wrote in the last report. They've settled for that as being "good enough" since they now know Melitopol/Crimea is impossible.
Tokmak is technically not far away from Verbove area, a mere 20km+. However looks are a little deceiving because Ukraine can't just keep pushing a deep wedge/salient from Verbove down to Tokmak as they would be surrounded on all sides and have the walls of the salient collapsed in on them from the sides. So in order to get down there they have to keep flattening the contact line which means capturing huge amounts of new territory south of Rabotino parallel to the Verbove salient, including the main road there. This would be a huge undertaking that's fairly inconceivable at the moment.
As for mobilization, one of the themes of recent reports claims that after taking major equipment losses Ukraine has utilized more and more meat assaults in Rabotino where non-mechanized troops simply run along the tree/hedge lines with maybe 1 or 2 IFVs attempting to "cover" them. There's a few videos where you can actually see this, for instance most recently: https://www.bitchute.com/video/F77pL3BVFOnS/
So what I'm saying is that they could use that tactic more and more, just use motorized men without heavy equipment running to the position.
Also, they will likely dig into trenches during the winter as they mobilize and bank on the West supplying more light armor by next spring. It's true the West is emptying reserves of the good stuff but there is still alot of crappy IFV/ICV/APC/AFV/IMV in the world. There's probably still tons of things like M113, YPR-765, BMP-1s, various MRAPs, French Vab4x4, Finnish XA-180, British Warriors, and various things of that nature. Not to mention that Sweden still claims to be in process of 'opening a Cv-90 factory in Ukraine' which is probably some kind of weird posturing.
But just as an example, the official number of built MaxxPro MRAPS is over 9,000. That's not counting thousands of Turkish Kirpi, British Huskies, and various other Scandinavian knockoffs thereof. So just in the MRAP department they can likely supply Ukraine forever and at some point UA will probably have few tanks but tons of light vehicles of that sort and will be forced to conduct offensives on them.
As for small arms and various RPG type of things, the world has nearly infinite of those so I don't see them running out of any of that any time soon. The real bottleneck will be heavy armor like tanks and good artillery/MLRS systems most likely (and their ammo).
I've been thinking lately that those MaxxPro and MRAPS aren't that bad of an option as long as they stop the larger shell fragments. MBTs, and AFVs armor cant protect against most of the ATGMS and FPVs being used. The land mines demobilize everything, so cheaper vehicles that keep the passengers and crew protected from the inevitable mine hit is a reasonable option.
Yep, also the Humvee. The official number of Humvees built is, I kid you not, 250,000 according to Wiki. They can supply those til the end of time. And newer Humvees can come with an assortment of weapons from ATGM/TOW to manpads, etc.
Ah yes, the mixed mercenary (I hear 1 American, 1 British, 2 perhaps 3 Aussie and a possible Canadian voice in that group) doing kinetic (shoot and frag first, check later) trench clearing. Lots of 5.56 going off, no obvious AK fire, likely no-one home.... Wonder if they stayed for the Russian artillery fire, or jumped back in the hummers and back to the local spa???
I’m glad I’ve read your post because by now I’ve seen innumerable videos showing what you just describe: groups of lightly armed soldiers casually shooting (almost leisurely) tens of magazines into holes in the ground and I’ve been wondering how seriously can they be taken, o don’t imagine Russian soldiers (or any soldier) passively hiding in a shallow hole and not defend themselves vigorously.
History Legends had a recent video on this. He argues that the vehicles are [now] not used in attack pre se but to ferry troops to near a jump off line, where they attack on foot. So really any 4x4 wheeled AFV would work on rough roads and tracks.
The pro-Russian blogosphere is IMHO getting too stressed by the latest UAF advances. The fact that they are now (barely) through a defensive crumple zone - having taken c 50% losses - and are now meeting or even into part of the first line of defence - simply means the Russian plan is working. They would not build multiple lines of defence had they anticipated stopping the UAF in front of them. The UAF is simply advancing in two areas into narrow salients which form fire traps. They are now seeking to deepen and widen the salients at maybe a few hundred metres a day, taking ,massive losses to to so. This allows a PR victory - "we are advancing in difficult circumstances". It is not really material who controls a few villages. The metric is who has a functioning army come the end of September. The UAF is winning itself to death, to coin a comment from an earlier war in this area.
Last Russian Ukraine war back in '14 or '15 there was a lot of talk about Cauldrons where the Ukies would advance only to find them surrounded and taking artillery from all sides. Last year this time there was a lot of talk about a "winter offensive." Now with no talk, I expect that is what will happen.
I agree with Simplicus that there is a lot of spare military kit in the world and certainly the UAF could mobilise these numbers of men into its ranks. There is probably enough assorted ammo too, but not the famed 155mm shells. I doubt the motivation of these latest press ganged troops, and their training is likely to be cursory. I know this sounds like the western media and expert clowns discussing Russian "conscripts". However I cannot see that the latest wave of cannon fodder will be remotely as effective as earlier ones. I have been surprised by the fortitude of the UAF soldiers pressing forward in the counter attacks. These men have shown courage. However the troops committed have been the UAF elite - its best trained, best equipped and best motivated soldiers. You cannot replace them quickly with youths fresh out of school and guys about to draw their pension - and who really do not want to die or become maimed.
I would expect Russia to maintain or up the tempo and scale of the fighting so as to grind down the UAF and not give it chance to recover. The latest UAF conscripts will be forced to battle before being trained or equipped properly and will suffer accordingly. It is quite sickening really. But war is war.
If they are light on armor they will be chewed up by cluster bombs now that both sides are using them. I think they are more effective against infantry than the people are admitting due to international disapproval.
Then the next stage of this conflict will be cheap-as-fuck paper anti-personnel loitering drones.
And when THOSE are put into 'civilian' service, that is pretty much the end for 'civilisation'. An assassin drone for $50? Easily constructed, only bottleneck explosives. Not difficult for organised crime, pissed off American patriots, and likely farmers angry at Big Ag/Banksters.
Undetectable. Unstoppable unless you live in a bunker.
These morons just couldn't stop. Couldn't say "We've got enough, now lets share it". Couldn't stop their mad dreams of "conquest".
They're idiots, imbeciles.
Orwell knew them from the war rooms. He wrote true.
Rabotino - what you describe is what my immediate reaction was: more Twitter Warrior-ing. MoonOfAlabama and BigSerge also noted that the parts that Ukraine have been advancing are lowlands compared to the areas the Russian troops still occupy - so "advances" are just more meatgrinding under ISR vectored artillery/mortar/missile/RPG fire.
Re; IFVs/AFVs
You make an excellent point on the numbers of AFVs/IFVs available and their use as fast battlefield/"not die from the first mine" transport.
However, how well do these vehicles stand up under drone, artillery or even RPG fire?
Also, what would the situation be if Russia really started an offensive including use of actual tanks? Does Ukraine have sufficent anti-armor or sufficiently heavily gunned AFVs/IFVs to have a serious chance of taking down T90s or other late gen tanks? Or the later twin-warhead RPG types?
As you note - there are almost certainly enough small arms but these "new" tactics - which are really just the stereotypical "Polish mine detector" joke in action, probably the joke will get renamed - again, it isn't clear to me that Ukrainian society will continue to accept massive casualties. If the choice is between death by Russian fire/mines/artillery vs. Death By SBU in rebelling against the Ukrainian regime - at least you can do the latter from home. It seems improbable that everyone in Ukraine does not know just how bad the military situation is despite historic levels of agitprop.
The trouble with tanks are they travel on ground and the ground is covered with mines. Anti-tank and Manpads both hand carried; the small groups heavily armed. For an offensive, I'm thinking heavily armed airborne troops and using the roads and bridges they left standing. You also notice in the videos some really big thermobaric missile hits, and some smaller drone hits. Expect more thermobaric hits. Against light armored groups like the Ukies are throwing the Russ, clusters bombs and artillery shells should clear wide swaths of forest, and I think Russ has an advantage with these. But I would rather take out the government rather than kill the 70 year old ex-school teachers they are drafting.
Agreed, there are mines and antitank. Manpads are for aircraft.
The question is: how many does Ukraine have? The disproportionate military industrial capacity Russia has shown vs. both Ukraine and the West certainly applies to mines as well.
The other thing is Russian tanks are far more mobile over rough terrain - due to lighter weight and desire objective - than Western equivalents. Not saying the Russian tanks are traipsing about like Humvees, but they are certainly far less restricted to roads than the Western stuff.
That Ukrainians are dying in droves does not affect the lives of the decisionmakers in Washington, or even the lives of their local satraps in Kiev one bit.
Another fine report as usual. Russian drones are causing so much more damage than Ukie drones, there's really no comparison, especially in the front line region. The small mostly silent grenade droppers are the worst. Every squad needs to have at least one drone guard/lookout on constant alert. And if you have a vehicle of any sort anywhere near the FEBA, you should anticipate being attacked by a drone. And drone density on the FEBA will only increase given their effectiveness. Even those cardboard drones are killers. The Donestk weather forecast for September looks good with little rain allowing for mobile warfare if Russia so decides. Rabotino looks like a caldron in the making.
Russia needs to step up its infrastructure attacks in the west of pookraine before winter, give the poles a few million more welfare recipients to support.
It also needs to arrange an accident for that italian ship if that was involved in the airport attacks, and then say "it wasnt us". Also, send wagners one by one on a european tour and arrange lots of accidental fires/explosions.
They should try to take out rail/road bridges, electrical stations, power generation plants, rail junctions, railheads, marshalling yards, airports systematically and all over the country. and keep hitting them repeatedly.
Hi! Long time reader, first time commenter. If I may ask a question... Col. Douglas McGregor puts Ukrainian manpower losses at 400k dead. How do you feel about that number, what would be your number, and how confident do you feel about that number?
It gets into the weeds of a lot of nuances of what do you consider losses. For instance, many people blanketly call "casualties" as anything including KIA/WIA/POW, etc.
If you very strictly mean killed in action only, it can be one number, but that wouldn't tell the whole story because there are also "irrecoverable losses" which are MIA/POW and WIA which are maimed with lost limbs, etc., such that they can't return to combat, which means they're no different than killed in action since they're out of combat permanently.
So if we say, how many total "irrecoverable losses" does Ukraine have, which would mean both KIA, MIA, POW, and also maimed and limbless to the point of not being able to fight any more. Here's my thinking on it:
There have been multiple specific leaks just on the maimed alone which have shown over 60k and that was long ago. In fact, in one of my recent reports I showed an actual Western MSM source that said 60k+ without limbs. That means they can't fight ever again.
Then, recall that Prigozhin is believed by some to be a "too honest" person to a fault. He admitted Wagner allegedly had 20k casualties in Bakhmut, but he said that they took over 60k dead Ukrainians with them. For the sake of argument, if we take him at his word, that means 60k dead Ukrainians just in Bakhmut alone. Add the 60k limbless/maimed that's 120k "irrecoverable losses" so far.
If we add many other meat grinders like Popasna, Lisichansk/Severodonetsk, Mariupol, etc., we get alot more. For instance, Mariupol is known to definitively have had a 15-20k garrison of AFU.
We know for a fact 4500-5000 of them were captured because there were 2500 captured in Azovstal confirmed, and another ~2000 at the Peter Ilich factory. Most of the remainder were liquidated. So Mariupol alone had at least 10-15k Ukrainian losses, if you give slight margin of error for escapees.
Without going into detail of every little battlefield otherwise, I would say that putting these together we'd have to say there's at least 150k irrecoverable losses which are the same as KIA but as high as 200-250k. This counts MIA/POW. Then just "wounded" there could be another 300-400k but many/most of those return to combat so it doesn't really matter counting them.
Recall one thing I said in some of my reports. KIA to POW is typically a given static ratio. For instance, just like WIA to KIA is usually anywhere from 3:1 to 5:1, POW:KIA is also a given ratio.
My point is that, in terms of KIA/casualties much of it is speculation, but POW is the only category where we actually have some confirmed numbers from BOTH sides, which is a very rare and critical thing. We have definitive evidence, which I've documented before in detail, that Russia at one point had 12-15k POWs of Ukrainian soldiers while Ukraine at the same time had about 2500 of Russian, give or take. If we take this same ratio and apply it to KIA or "irrecoverable losses", and if we use Russian KIA/irrecoverable to be somewhere in the 50-60k range (combining all Russian allied forces, LDPR, paramilitary, PMC, volunteer, etc.) that means Ukraine would have to have (12-15k/2500 = 5-7 ratio) 50-60k x 5-7 = 250-350k irrecoverable losses.
And this actually matches other sources which follow AFU losses with highly developed algorithms/methodologies such as https://wartears.org/ which currently has AFU at around 250k dead: https://i.imgur.com/j18cPkL.jpg
So I would say in terms of actual dead and underground it could be around 150k then if you count limbless/maimed and irrecoverable it could be 250k+ or even more.
However, this is undercounted subtle "conditioning" from MSM because this is a recent article but already from late last year we had "leaks" from the AFU that they had 60k limbless. Which would mean by now it's far more than that.
Something to add to the mix here is the degradation of rapid transport to/from the "grey zone" where most casualties occur.
On the Russian side, we have Minister Shoigu stating a wounded Russian soldier is at the aid post in 10 minutes, and the nearest M.A.S.H equivalent inside one hour (the "Golden Hour" critical to survival).
How does Ukraine fare in that regard?? It seems not well. There was video on Telegram recently of a Female Ukraine soldier, with both legs amputated at the knee. There was matching helmet-cam from her POV from when she stepped on the mine. In the few frames of the aftermath, her lower legs didn't look badly damaged (i.e. not completely blown off, but obviously with shrapnel). Her squad obviously applied tourniquets to suppress bleeding, but equally obvious is the failure to get her to quality medical care within the hour necessary to save her lower limbs.
Whether this is because such care is too far away, too overwhelmed with casualties (Has the Ukraine reached the point of hacking off limbs, ala the American Civil War, to save lives, because saving limbs requires resources they no longer have??) or simply exhausted from attrition, is hard to guess.
Casualties still occur at the 3:1 rate in the field, but one of the 3 bleeds out before getting to care, bringing the ratio to 2:2, i.e. 1:1 which some think is closer to Ukrainian reality, and these just get left where they fell, staying on their battalion books, drawing pay, which goes straight to the chain of command.
The lesser wounded go into indifferent or overwhelmed medical care, to become some other statistic.
In this light 250k dead to this point is wishful thinking (probably a barely pre Bakhmut number), 400k is near certainly an undercount and 500k the likely minimum.
We won't truly know until this is over, and farmers stop finding bodies to count when they plough their fields.
I am very curious to see how things pan out in Robatino. They must truly believe they are on the verge of a breakthrough and that they have attrited Ru forces significantly. Otherwise this makes no sense.
US media is very big on covering statements like “Robotino has fallen! To Ukraine” and “Next stop - the sea of Azoc”, and very small on showing maps that put the distances and the size of these major conquered “towns” in perspective. We are to believe they will chop their way to the coast meter by meter and that the flanks will guard themselves.
Also, Russia is out of manpower and unable to reinforce or rotate troops so as soon as the front line is breached it will be clear sailing all the way to Moscow!
“If you’re next to an airbase for instance, you can fly an FPV drone from the fence outside of the base right onto a plane and blow it up then leave by car long before authorities have figured out what even happened.”
You mean that security could be so lax around an air base, that one could just drive up next to its fence, fly a drone into an airplane on the base, and leisurely drive away without even being noticed? Lol, I don’t think I could even drive into the parking lot of a McDonald’s restaurant anywhere in the US without being noticed in a moment or recorded on camera!
Well, keep in mind this has happened so rarely that I think it shows it's not quite as easy as it sounds. But I guess from a 'relatively speaking' perspective it's a easy way to *attempt* to do a strike.
It's greatly exacerbated by virtue of this being a "brother war" where both sides look and talk alike. If this was U.S. in Iraq for instance it wouldn't fly because an Iraqi loitering near the edge of the base would be an immediate suspicion. But because Ukraine/Russians are so alike it creates opportunities for infinite types of sabotage.
They did that in Iraq all the time, hit and run guerrilla stuff. It is amazing the stuff people can do right in front of your face and you never see it until it is too late.
Is it possible that the US is behind the coups in Africa?
But, we might ask, why would they do something that harms their ally, France? Well, we could ask the same question about the Nordstream pipelines and the harm that their demolition caused Germany. In both cases, they cut off Germany/France from needed resources (including energy), weakened their position as independent powers, rendered them more dependent on the US, thereby ensuring that their vassal status to the US empire will continue into the future. Add to that the depletion of weaponry sent to Ukraine, and the mass hysteria over the "Russia threat" that Europeans have been subjected to, and we end up with a thoroughly captured Europe who will do whatever the US demands...including getting in a trade/sanctions skirmish with China.
They might also be trying to lure Russia and/or China into a conflict in Africa, where the US can more readily project power. The Ukraine war shows that Russia cannot be beaten in its own neighborhood, while simulations suggest that China would readily defeat the US in a confrontation in the west Pacific. So the only way the US can challenge them is to draw them outside of their comfort zones, and Africa would make a perfect candidate. China has made inroads into Africa, and has big plans. Russia, too. So they have something to fight for...but it isn't clear that they will take the bait.
You could have a point. For instance, when the Sudan coup occured, many believed it to be pro-Russian since the rapid response forces had connections to Russia/Wagner. However, it also became known that U.S. was cultivating them as well.
Ultimately I don't think anything is black and white and most politicians/factions/movements try to hedge their bets or at least be "open" to various actors/state powers so it's definitely possible they can be playing both sides to an extent and trying to see who offers them more. For instance I already wrote about how the junta in Niger was not necessarily as it seems since the leader they overthrew was already anti-French colonialist. So I think what you're saying definitely has merit as things are much more complicated and nuanced than they seem.
With that said, if U.S. gains power at Europe's expense, that still somewhat suits Russia. Russia doesn't mind a powerful U.S. As long as Europe gets extremely weak then Russia will dominate them or at least have no fear of them. It's better for Russia to have just U.S. be powerful rather than both U.S. and Europe powerful, with Europe being used as a pitbull against Russia right on its doorstep.
Completely agree. So far the over-arching big picture geopolitical strategy of the US appears to be exactly similar to what it was in the cold war: isolation, economic war, proxy conflicts around the world, and ultimately aiming for revolution inside Russia. Russia is more confident this time because it is in a much better position than 1945, has better leverage in the global economy, a strong relationship with China, and BRICS+ is icing on the cake. The US, on the other hand, is in a terrible state that can only be papered over for so long by funny money (as opposed to post-WW2, when it was the only major industrial power that had not been destroyed).
I don't think we are in a better position than in 1945, at least in terms of army. Soviet army in 1945 was without any questions most experienced, battle hardened and adequately equipped in the world. The Soviets annihilated ~1mln Japanese army in about a month with only a fraction of their forces diverted from the eastern parts.
Agreed except that a weak Europe is not necessarily a benefit to the US power projection. Vassals need to be subservient but not weak otherwise they aren’t as useful as a bulwark against your adversaries, and if they don’t have some level of self sufficiency they can be a drag on your resources. Not to mention that if the reason for the weakness of the vassal is the hegemon itself, sooner rather than later chaos ensues and the vassal starts to align themselves with powers that help stabilize them instead.
I think if some of the actions we are seeing in Africa is due to a combination of:
1) General corruption in Africa. Not the first time
2) Russia and China support
3) The US taking control from European powers
The third is not stemming from grand geopolitical game but simply acquisition regardless of the party on the other end. Think the sub deal with Australia. The US didn’t hesitate to take it away from France and the reaction was some angry words. That’s it.
I would also like to point out the difference between France and Germany. Germany is completely vassalized and under the thumb of the US (same with Japan but slightly less in Japan). France due to its culture of rebellion and skepticism and, at least until recently, independent education system and freer media, are harder to control. Point being, Nordstream was the US acting with impunity against Germany, while the Australian sub deal and Africa goings on are an attempt to cut France to size and gaining leverage against it.
Yes smo is slow, not just because as simplicius mentioned, and it's nazi ideology but the military training its under going.
Obama and Medvedev have a cozy relationship. And I have seen a possibility open that US and Russians are working together...i mean come on, no sincere leader would genocide his population. The Russians will show up on US soil to defeat the whatever resistance we garner over here to reestablish the republic. I thought, as did Britain fear back in the 1850s that a Russian and US alliance could rule the world. Well the bastards have it at thier feet now and we will be in the 1000yr whatever, maybe we should side with Belgium and eat Z bugs and be like Renfield.
That theory is definitely questionable, which is why some believe they came from Estonia. With that said you have to remember this happened in the middle of the night when the country is sleeping, and the route would have likely programmed the drones to circumvent all major city centers (where powerful AD systems would typically be stationed anyway) and instead fly over rural regions. Open up your google maps and click satellite mode on the "layers" then follow along from Sumy/Chernigov to east of Smolensk. There's nothing but farms and open ground with a few tiny settlements. Now imagine flying over all that at 3am in the morning on a cardboard drone that probably doesn't make much noise--it could be possible, but we don't know for sure how it was done. For all we know, they had saboteurs who drove the disassembled drones in a car to the area, assembled them nearby (particularly if they're the cardboard variety) and then launched them from right near the base.
Also I'd like to point out that when Ukraine used the Bober/Beaver drones on Moscow, there were several videos of people who "heard" the propeller/engine noise of the drone and began to film them flying at low ~100ft altitude. You can still look up and find these videos from the outskirts of Moscow.
But what's interesting to me is, this was a rare case when they struck during the day so many people were out and about and heard the drones. However it's interesting that they only "heard" them when they were right on the outskirts of Moscow. Moscow has a much larger outlying area that's still "urbanized" rather than rural, where tons of people live, for instance down to Kaluga etc.
So this raises a very big question: why didn't people during the daylight hour "hear" these propeller drones farther out like near Kaluga, etc. Why did they only begin to hear and film them en masse much closer to Moscow? It almost seems to suggest that the drones are not actually flying from Ukraine but are in fact being launched from somewhere "nearby".
Given the work on the Penicillin, you'd think applying that to annoying drone engines would be an obvious solution. But you're back to the "not enough systems" problem, which means you need a very-Russian solution "how to make Penicillin really cheap if it doesn't need to move". I think it ends up being similar to how Serbia used tv antennas to track F117s.
What is
Too much cope not good for your brain.
Go away John, you dickhead.
@ John
Will the unicorns also return to poop rainbow colored Skittles™?
Lol. Comedian like Zelenskyy!
Well technically Russia already attacked NATO by destroying their $200 million dollar MQ-9 Reaper drone over Crimea. I don't recall NATO having much of an answer to that, other than mouse-like squeaking noises.
Thanks for clarifying. You're right, the mighty USA has Russia shaking in its boots.
You mean the flying trash can (aka f35) boondoggle. It would have to rank with GM's Corvair. If you care to check the GAO's November 2022 report they conclude that "Weapon System Sustainment Aircraft Mission Capable Goals Were Generally Not Met and Sustainment Costs Varied by Aircraft." Maintenance seems an increasing issue for US services including the USN.
Hey, I had a Corvair, I loved it. It was great in the snow.
"Unsafe at any speed" ring a bell? It made Ralph Nader. The car had major design problems. I'm glad you've survived it.
You guys are showing your age!
Not true. Ralph Nader was Public Enemy #1 in my mind. Drove it all through college. Fun and economical.
Hmm, Let's see ... How about we start with the Air Force, shall we?
F15's? From the 70s
F16s? From the 70s
F18s? From the 70s
B52s? From the 50s
B1s? From the 70s
A10s? From the 70s
That accounts for almost the entire US combat aircraft inventory, as there are only about 16 B2's, the F35s are still not (fully) operational and not combat capable (nor will they ever be), and the relatively small number of F22s are already slated to be withdrawn from service (well before the aircraft they were supposed to replace).
How about the navy's ships?
Arleigh Burke destroyers? From the 80s
Nimitz carriers? From the 70s
Ohio-class submarines? From the 70s
Los Angeles-class submarines? From the 70s
Ticonderoga cruisers? From the 80s
Wasp amphibious assault ships? From the 80s
That's the bulk of the combat ships they have accounted for, unless of course you want to count those Littoral bathtubs as 'combat' ships.
It's no better with the Army by the way, the US armed forces rely on weaponry dating back to the 70s and 80s. Soviet-era, I believe that is popularly called.
And you know what's even better? Most of the systems developed to replace them have failed, often spectacularly. For most of those I listed above, there is effectively nothing (affordable) in the pipeline to replace them with in future.
So basically, the last time the US was able to build effective hardware was the 70s/80s. Considering that our economic & cultural decay began gaining momentum around 1971, and it would take another 20 years or so for the old guard to retire, the time-frames add up quite well. Also, I read that alot of the cutting edge Russian tech you're seeing now (loitering munitions, hypersonic missiles, glide bombs, etc) was developed by the US back in that era, then completely neglected.
In fact, here's my source, Armchair Warlord: https://twitter.com/ArmchairW/status/1667007971363262464
"the last time the US was able to build effective hardware was the 70s/80s"
One small addition there needed: 'COST-effective'. Some of the replacement systems that failed did so not because of performance failures of the design, but because the cost-to-benefit ratio was way out of proportion and did not justify its continuation.
The B2 and F22 are also examples of this wildly out of whack cost-to-performance ratio, they do have utility, but nowhere enough to justify their enormous costs (both for acquisition and operational costs). But due to the massive political capital invested in those programs (and greasing the right pockets), they were allowed to continue.
My father was USAF in that time period. Piloted B-52s for SAC. Slept in wooden barracks by the runway, if the alarm went off it meant the russkies planes were on their way over the North Pole. They had 15 minutes to get six eight engine bombers off of one runway and on their way to bounce the rubble.
He later worked on A-10 and B-1. Basically, the USAF went to shit and forgot how to build planes when he retired....
So, basically, the premise that boomers are bloated, overindulged, and useless parasites is correct. They were given a paradise of advanced technology, overwhelming wealth, and unsurpassed productivity and they pissed it away on Jimmy Buffet tapes, luxury cruises, and silver RVs.
That's an important qualification, thanks. This ties into another issue, which is that larger military budgets do not necessarily translate into greater strength -- it could just mean there's more corruption, waste & inefficiency.
An Internet troll is someone who enters an online discussion and posts comments designed to upset or disrupt the conversation.
"Dark Tetrad" personality traits include narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism.
-psychology today
Do you think the John you replied to is a real person, a propaganda operative, or a bot?
I know a large majority of people are morons but this so called 'John' is living in a fantasy land that is so preposterous it's not even funny anymore.
It must be tiresome having to respond to ludicrous statements like the above.
Well you made me curious so I checked his post history. He has a comment from May of this year which states:
"The west will soon launch a massive strike to drive Russia out of Ukraine and decimate their forces."
Well, you gotta hand it to him, at least he's sticking to his predictions. Though the repeated re-use of the word "soon" half a year apart is a little questionable.
"Soon" is a somewhat fuzzy term. Reminds me of one of Mark Twain's travelling reports. He had read that glaciers drift into the valley and tried to use one, in the Alps as I recall it, as a means of public transportation. He became impatient long before reaching his destination and was mildly upset with the source of information he had relied on. ;-)
Does he not know that "decimate" means reduce by a tenth? In this war a lot of commanders would settle for a casualty-rate like that.
just as soon as they train up all the retarded guys they are mobilizing, poor bastards . ukroids even made a new category of "combat capable " to stop the families of these mentally challenged guys from contesting their mobilization. its over when ya gotta go that low
Nah some are like sitting too long on a ball, you know...prostatitis and a hyper inflated bladder
I vote bot or troll.
Russia also pretty directly killed a bunch of NATO officers and soldiers in a couple of recent Kinzhal strikes. NATO had no response for that, either.
While I am sympathetic to Russia - it is difficult to ignore some of the more blatant happening ons in this war - as I have mentioned in other replies to this article I find it strange that Russia has not given Western leaders a good scaring with missile strikes on their positions when visiting Ukraine - I cant imagine Stalin during WW2 allowing Nazi officials to stroll around near Soviet lines and not at least try to assassinate or blow them up. I am sure they had some talking with the good ole "Western Partners" and were "asked" to not fire. But when Russia is sanctioned and treated like a pariah by them, acquiescing to Western demands is weakness. The West understands only the language of strength, any attempt at being "held back" (задержанный - if you speak Russian) is viewed as weakness. Next is the fact that Russia allows the rada to meet and pass ever more anti-Russian draconian laws without multiple missile strikes of the Rada to paralyze Ukraines government. Why was Zelensky able to visit Izyum, all while being within artillery range? Why is Ukraine not being flattened as Dresden was during WW2? While I am Ukrainian born and appreciate Russia trying to be "humane" at the start of this conflict, now this does not matter - Ukrainians will still blame and hate Russia regardless of what they do, so might as well end it fast and painlessly and show other nations that it is not worth messing with it (this woukd be a clear message for Kazakhstan, as this war will repeat with Kazakhstan in 20 years). Finally, Ukraine keeps talking about "rebuilding" and making deals in this regard as if its victory is a foregone conclusion, perhaps it knows something we do not? If one is to read Russian language accounts of soldiers, both sides agree on one thing - this whole thing is a договорняк (agreement).
The way we should view this conflict is through the lens of "WWSD" - "What Would Stalin Do" to find the answers
Point is (abd like you yourself said), there have been many strange twists during this war - Russian elites making a deal with the West may be one such twist.
what's with you and stalin? lol
1. Russia has pointedly not declared war, nor has any NATO country declared war on Russia. so while the SMO is defacto a war, and everyone (except Russian leaders) calls it a war, there a actions which cannot be taken unless at war... both in terms of Russian constitution and international law, which Russia tries to uphold.
2. Russia has made it clear that it is not targeting, nor intends to target, civilians. Attacking either Ukrainian or other nations' politicians would mean targeting civilians.
Also, humanity will finally locate the G-spot.
I am pretty sure its located somewhere in the female pocketbook.
This brings a new twist on a Moleskine
Oh here he is again banging on about a naval blockade. John you are a troll, and not very good at it.
NATO can "announce" whatever they fancy, but announce will be all they can do.
How do they enforce this no-fly zone and blockade?
You must be British.
wet dreams
time to grow up
An Internet troll is someone who enters an online discussion and posts comments designed to upset or disrupt the conversation.
"Dark Tetrad" personality traits include narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism.
-psychology today
4 x IL-76 lost is anything but meaningless.
And if that came from Estonia, it is most definitely not meaningless either.
That is a probing action to see if Putin will not react to attacks from NATO territory.
Given the non-stop displays of pathetic weakness and outright treason since March 2022, there is a high chance the Kremlin will once again prefer to pretend nothing happened, which will only invite further such strikes.
i like your cock sure attitude.. i don't share it and think you are wrong..
Lot of MI6 'John' and 'James' suddenly very 'chic
yeah - not chic like natoistan... braindead response..
Sure in a vacuum it's not meaningless, but in the context of the hostilities, i.e. compared against what Ukraine is losing on a daily basis, it is quite meaningless. Particularly given the fact that the planes and airfield don't have any utility for the SMO.
If they came from Estonia then of course that's a gigantic deal, but most likely they didn't though we can't discount anything.
There is no good scenario here.
It very much looks like they came from Estonia, but let's look at all the possibilities:
1) If they came from Estonia and the Kremlin just swallows it once again, that opens up Russia for attacks from NATO territory. Or from the sea. Obvious next target is Olenya and the Tu-95s. If the IL-76 isn't a huge deal, those very much are.
2) If it came from Latvia through Poland and Lithuania, same thing.
3) If it came from Sumy/Chernigov and Russia didn't even detect them (21 2-stroke engine drones!!!), then once again, one by one strategic assets will be taken out with impunity, unless finally the Kiev regime is dealt with decisively.
The only safe places will be area immediately behind the Urals. Not even the Far East -- they will be launching drones from "commercial" ships.
But the Kremlin is still in "we want a deal so that our oligarchs can be again accepted as part of the club in Courchevel" mode and there is no prospect for that happening any time soon if past performance continues to be the most reliable predictor of future actions.
1a. No confirmation or even any evidence these attacks originated in NATO territory. Already given is a very reasonable explanation of how these attacks likely originated from Russian territory. The burden of proof is on you as your claim is the least likely and you have given zero evidence.
1b. You assume that the Tu-95 bases, which are used in the SMO and are much more valuable assets, are poorly defended like the IL-76s. Dyagilevo and Engels air bases are also much deeper inside Russia and thus much more difficult to get to in the strictly physical sense.
2. See above.
3. 3% of Russia's heavy lift capacity subjected to minor/moderate damage in an operation that took months to plan and coordinate is hardly "strategic assets" being "taken out with impunity." The last event like this was months ago. I doubt that Russia's strategic capabilities will be in any way effected by tiny, exceptionally difficult to plan and execute attacks that occur months apart. This while Russia strikes Ukraine's strategic depths with dozens of missiles, bombs, and drones on a daily and nightly basis.
In summation: your insane extrapolations from a singular data point are just that: insane extrapolations from a single data point.
Just last week they lost a Tu-22M3 to a drone strike
It is very far from a "months apart" event, and anyway, it is the trend that matters, not what has happened already.
A very alarming trend of meaningless, minor losses. Putin will surrender any day now and NATO will break up Russia into tiny, exploitable fragments. QED.
There's a trend here. NATO is adapting within the parameters of the SMO. Pretty much NATO is still well contained in their involvement. They still couldn't do the shooting. It is still Ukraine who are still conducting the ground war. I fear the day when it is an all out war against NATO.
Why the fear? Oh, maybe because you live in a NATO country?
Maybe Russia needs to build some hardened hangers.
IL 76 is roughly the size of a B52
You would need really huge Hangars
😎
someone please remind this "super" patriot that this is a war.
things are destroyed in a war.
that is why more are built.
If the mentioned cardboard drones have been used it would be helpful to know some technical details. Especially, are they made of your everyday "raw" cardboard? If the cardboard isn't sealed against humidity I very much doubt they are able to fly for hours during the night, even if it didn't rain. I guess one would have to know about the dew point along a possible rout. Whatever, just a thought about the survivability of such a thing in this climate and at night.
If as Simplicius suggests, they were launched within < 5 km of the destination, air moisture would not matter. The other benefit is that there would be almost no trace of the weapon after detonation.
The question I have about the cardboard drone hypothesis is how much explosive payload could a cardboard drone possibly carry?
I'd suggest at least a kg, as the cardboard is thick and sturdy. Not at all flimsy like a pizza box
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sypaq_Corvo_Precision_Payload_Delivery_System
3kg, which can be quite a bit depending on explosive type used.
I find it hard to believe that MI6 spent months planning an operation with Ukrainian operatives inside Russia who could be caught at any time. That MI6 would spend months planning an operation inside Estonia seems more likely to me.
Saw a military analysis by that Austrian guy recently and he was also predicting ukr attacks on strategic assets. I think the unintended consequence is simply that Russia begins ramping up manufacturing of strategic assets. Whereas NATO will not.
Pre the offensive Reisner predicted a wave of attacks like this intended to distract attention and sow confusion. I have not seen his latest piece mentioned in the article but in the previous one he detailed all the defences. Then he proceeded to show the projected lines of UAF advance as if they did not exist. His first reports were pretty good. Subsequent ones indicate to me he has been "ordered" to comply with the standard approved western narrative.
So he's been drinking the western kool schnapps? Someone's been feeding him porkie schnitzels? Has someone been whispering in his ear and dropping letters in his lederhosen? A vendetta in Vienna? This is high drama my friend.
Indeed. To add to what you daid ' Ukraine keeps making "deals" with various Western countries about "rebuilding" "after the war", as if its victory is assured. If theres one thing we know, is that if Ukraine keeps announcing something it ends up happening. Perhaps theres a deal with Russia putting on a show but ultimately allowing its self to lose in return for Western concessions? This would explain much of the stranger stuff going on in the SMO - like no flattening of Ukraine (at this point the Ukrainian population is so brainwashed that it matters not if you fight humanely or flatten Ukraine America style - you will stoll be accused of warcrimes), no targetting of Zelensky, somehow the attacks on BOTH Zaluzhny and Budanov both failing, etc.
Not exactly failing.
Assumptions upon assumptions. Next you'll be building a climate model.
The mighty Nato has literally been relegated to staging covert terror attacks through its almost completely destroyed Nazi proxy, on non-strategic non-hardened targets, with cardboard drones. Enough said. I'm sure not even the Taliban are impressed. And do you really think Russia hasn't retaliated to all these attacks? What's happening in Africa is an absolute nightmare for the West. That's not a coincidence. Nato wants Russia to act aggressive and attack another country so they can get more countries on the sanctions ship. Nato wouldn't even fight Iraq or Afghanistan without first completely isolating them. It has refused to go to war with Iran even though it's been sanctioning it since the 80's. It is beyond the realm of possibility that they would ever go to war with Russia, especially with China not only on its side, but literally next door. When even a blind guy locked in a cave can see you're getting stronger while your enemy is getting weaker and more desperate by the day, the last thing you want to do is give up the initiative by overreacting to what is essentially a couple minor casualties of war. As long as Russia doesn't give the West an excuse to put its MIC on a war footing or start taking heavy casualties, I don't see why they would be in any hurry. The longer they drag this conflict out, the deeper the West digs it's own grave.
What's been happening in Africa is an absolute nightmare for FRANCE. Together with the decapitation of Wagner, the US is doing really well in Africa, controlling more and more governments directly.
IF, IF, IF
totally meaningless
you've got an ax to grind and you're going to IF it until you do.
It is an escalation, a "provocation." The US military wants to fight an insurrection/ guerrilla style war against Russia that beat them in Vietnam and Afghanistan. They didn't expect a SMO this scale. Suicide drone attacks with low radar signatures are going to continue to ramp up and be a problem. Russia will be seeing swarms. I thought they could stop them with electronic means, but you have to detect them to take them out.
Hi, I have been monitoring a Telegram site called Baltic Antifascists. They report that a huge military exercise was scheduled at the border across from the attack site on the night of the attack. They also heard a lot of aircraft flying overhead. The article suggested that some of the aircraft may have been drones, but it did not prove that. The people on the Telegram site are convinced that they attack came from Estonia.
I have no idea if it did or not.
One of these days Ukraine is going to hit something such as an Apartment block or Shopping mall where you may see hundreds killed. If I were the Ukrainian MOD I would make certain that the attack came from a NATO country so there is no ambiguity.
Strelkovite always the first troll to post as Saker used to say..
I don't reckon GM is a troll. He's just an ignorant twat with little to no critical thinking skills.
There are a lot of people in Russia and around the world who feel the same way as GM, including Prig and Wagner. Think it isn't a problem for Putin? The right staged an insurrection. There is some danger to Putin from the right. There are people in Russia who want Putin to use the nuke to show he will. They see his weakness as encouraging escalation by the West because they think "Putin is bluffing." That's John Bolton telling you directly.
...and 82% of the people in RU don't feel the same way.
Is it a "weakness" that the RF is not using a nuke?"
Who is GM? Just another opinion among many others.
What do you know about Prig?
John Bolton? a has been neo-con that has been put out to pasture by everyone except CNN. lmao
There is no one more right than Putin.
Actually, strategy demands Putin plays game this way, way of SMO.
Each escalation is in a way starting a new war and side that escalates takes responsibility for the result, before its own citizens.
The current result is US/West pushing Ukrainians into death without chance for victory.
Putin will not miss the chance to hit hard and succeed when moment comes.
War is assymetric, development unstable, Ukraine’s logistical, manpower demands rising, willingness to support, number of recruitable men falling...
Putin is waiting for the culmination, point of exhaustion.
And then, between the first serious US offer at negotiations and a final collapse of defence is the time for real counteroffensive, when wins will be big and irreversible and casualties low.
Aren't those requisite traits for a troll?
An Internet troll is someone who enters an online discussion and posts comments designed to upset or disrupt the conversation.
"Dark Tetrad" personality traits include narcissism, Machiavellianism, psychopathy, and sadism.
- quoted from Psychology Today
but responding the way you want means almost certainly all out war with the whole of NATO.
Maybe you think that's okay. Maybe you think it is inevitable. Alright. But then wouldn't you do it at a time of your own choosing if it's going to be done? And in a way of your own devising?
But NATO is now directly attacking.
What next? Just keep taking hits to strategic assets? This isn't the USSR, it is the greatly diminished Russia which has long been on the very edge of sufficiency in terms of those thing.
P.S. Estonia and Latvia won't be nuked because they are a 30% and 40% Russian, respectively. But if Russia does a strategic strike against Poland and wipes it out completely, there will be no all-out war. That will be the end of it, because lethal intent will have been demonstrated in the most unmistakable way. Nobody will sacrifice DC for Warsaw. And the whole NATO bluff will be called.
The real problem is that this will give the US the excuse to solve its own problems around the world the same way. And if there is a way to deal with the current situation without opening that Pandora box, then indeed, it should be avoided. But those options are rapidly running out.
Another option is completely take Ukraine including Western Ukraine but that is precisely the type of escalation the west is trying to provoke. Besides Russia isnt going to start ww3 over some potential drones that probably came from within russia. Thats just crazy talk.
If NATO wants to intervene, then any pretext for intervention will do.
You have no evidence that NATO is "directly attacking". Stavka will have a pretty clear idea of the facts here, if not now, within a few days. I would expect any reaction to be based on those facts, proportionate, in line with their overall strategic objectives (ie no distractions) and taken with a view to avoid WW3 and in their own good time.
"NATO is now directly attacking." You keep saying this. But you have yet to show even a shred of proof for this blind assertion. Of course, NATO has been pretty directly involved from day 1 in that NATO officers have been commanding Uke units (tons of reports of orders in English being broadcast over tactical nets) and even barely avoiding capture in Azovstal. The springtime incursions in the Belgorod region seemed to have been led by NATO special forces soldiers. NATO ISR has designated targets for the Ukes from the beginning. There is no "trend" in NATO involvement; it has stayed pretty static from the get go and if there is a trend, it is that NATO is actually cutting back its involvement as it has virtually nothing of value left to send.
You seem to think that Russia is afraid of calling NATO's bluff but the opposite seems true. Russia destroyed that Global Hawk drone over the Black Sea. Russia has had no problem sending Kinzhal missiles into gatherings of NATO officers inside of Ukraine and seems to have killed at least several hundred of them so far.
Big Serge has a term for people like you: Schizopatriot.
Another troll characteristic, obnoxiously pushing the same point over and over sans proof.
Words today are on the edge of meaningless but we still must try.
'NATO' is not attacking. The US is using NATO to attack Russia. It is using Kiev to attack Russia. It is using everything and anything to attack Russia.
But because of the apathy of the masses etc. that is NOT 'NATO'.
And those apathetic masses in Poland, men women and children, do not deserve to be 'nuked' and should not be and contemplating such courses of action was a hallmark of the utter insanity of Zelensky.
You don't seem to get it how deep Russophobia runs in Europe, and how little it has to do with any historical misdeeds on the Russian side.
No, I don't get it. And I doubt it very much. But were it true it wouldn't excuse 'nuking' a whole nation, now would it?
yes, russophobia runs deep in europe.
but europe is toothless.
europe's russophobia is guiding its foreign policy to the detriment of europe.
i'd be more concerned about the rise of the 3rd reich mentality in europe. it has never died
This is insanity! You assert that a nation can "nuke" an entire (deserving-in-your-thinking) people off the face of the earth, simply, without any reaction, without any pause, and then assert that the rest of the world will do nothing about it, because in your estimation, they just won't.
You are living in a fantasy geo-political world of your own mind; clearly mega-maniacal. Standing way to close to your emotions.
To think there are people out there who wouldn't stoop that low is just being naive. These people control by fear and the masses dance to their tune.... even you. It might not be a nation but these "people" will destroy civilizations just to be "right" Yea sure it might not be nuclear, my guess it will be "biological". and "they" DO have the control.
Migram experiment is one example of the mind of the masses.
Humans have become weak minded controlled by hate fear etc., by living in this "cage of society" with everything handed to them on a bloody "silver platter."
Everyone is a slave to this " system"... A system of "throw away lives" with no regards with the miracle of life itself.
They sow fear.
Thousands of dead Iraqis, Japanese, Vietnamese, Yugos, etc. If they can't bomb them, they sanction them to death.
RU in Estonia 22% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Estonia
RU in Latvia 24.1% https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russians_in_Latvia
what is your hang up with nuked?
simple minds simple solutions
Estonia is disinfo. Anyway let's all give GM the doomer and gloomer applause for his latest attempt at bullshit.
Hysteria is not a good look.
Putin is a white man and white men are nice .... until they aren't. When the time is right Russia will settle its scores with the Baltic "nations" including Finland and all will simply cease to exist. They had their chance to shine and stand up to US bullying but the women running their "nations" and pretending to be as tough as real men bowed down to that bullying exactly the way a real man would never do.
buzz bombs!
And what if the attack did not come from NATO territory? Or came from NATO territory without the knowledge of the local government, launched secretly by Ukraine or the CIA (or, realistically, both)? As long as they have plausible deniability, any Russian response would be portrayed as a casus belli.
I just did a voiceover for SouthFrong. 4x IL76 not "lost" but damaged. How much is the question. The Baltics are very close.The targeted airport is located almost 700 km from the border with Ukraine. While the distance from Pskov to the Latvian border is about 65 kilometers. Not Estonia but Latvia.. The Ukraianians insist that this was a RUSSIAN group -- inside Russia. Don't believe everything you read. The Wagner Crash is a good exmple. This incident another.
Truth & Lies: The Wagner Crash https://julianmacfarlane.substack.com/p/truth-and-lies-the-wagner-crash-3f7
I agree. Nato keeps crossing these red lines because Russia doesn't ever retaliate. These repeated drone strikes on crimea and elsewhere are embarrassing for Russia, imo
Russia retaliates quite a lot.
But whenver they do it, you seem it as: "They should have done this anyway!"
Ask yourself: Why were Western leaders traveling in and out of Ukraine the last year almost weekly, but this year they seem to be pussies and don't dare it?
Why did the West accept it when Russia just striked on the Romanian border which also hit Romanian assets?
All I know is ukraine hits Russia weekly not monthy. They have hit the crimean bridge, crimea ammo storages, airfields, etc with drones recently. Crimea was supposed to be a red line yet it'd been hit multiple times the past month
Yes, yes, but to what result? It's like some kid throwing rocks at your windows. A nuisance for sure, but that's basically all it is. Meanwhile, losing yet another army of materiel and "meat" while Russia continues to stockpile weapons and men.
And they retaliated to their little attacks on Crimea and stopped the grain deal and bombed their grain silos even on the Romanian border!
They lost 20 billion USD per year in retaliation for something that is barely an inconvenience for the Russian army.
And the strike on this airfield makes no difference in the war whatsoever. Its a broken country that is lashing out via terror attacks. They don't achieve anything.
I rather have them do those twitter stunts for media points, than have them actually have some military success.
Hell, the last military success they had is now more than 10 months in the past.
Pence and others weren't recently seen in Kiev?
The question is why did Russia not target Western leaders and give them quite a scare? Nothing will make them look as bad. The Russians even let Zelensky enter Izyum to within Artillery range and did nothing!
Are you seriously asking the question why Russia didn't assassinate Western leaders? Remember that most of them asked for allowance before traveling there.
Yes I am seriously asking this question - can you imagine Stalin allowing Nazi officials to visit any conquered territory near the front lines and not try to assassinate or blow them up with a 155 mm shell, during WW2? If Stalin had missiles, you can rest assured that he'd be constantly firing them on the Budenstag and blowing up as many Nazi Officials as possible.
Then there is the question of all of the Nato Analysts working in Ukraine that Simplicus mentions in his ISR article - why are they allowed to operate with impunity?
Always remember "What Would Stalin Do"
Always remember "What Would Stalin Do"
Why?
geopolitics is not always apparent.
if one is looking for a hit me an i hit you solution to problems one will never expand one's view to include other solutions.
successful geopolitics means you don't play the game by someone else's rules.
The conventional wisdom right now is this was done INSIDE Russia and not from the Baltic states. Out of ALL the airfields in Russia, that they pick one not related to the SMO (ie Engels) or other high value assets that they could have picked speaks volumes of their inability to hit those Russian targets. How many IL-76 does Russia have? I thought it was 400+ plus another 20 on order this year (I might be off but something in that ballpark). 2 lightly damaged and 2 badly damaged. Again this might change, but thats what I heard so far.
The future is probably going to be:
1) building fortified hangars for all planes valuable enough
2) complete jamming of all radiocommunication frequencies of all airbases
3) sitch to sound based detectors. Instead of trying to find the drones on radar, develop sound/electro-optical detection systems for drones. You can install EW moduls with sound and electro-optical sensors around the parked aircraft, like some sort of a CIWS system. When they "hear" or "see" a drone, they fry it. Those anti-drone moduls are already starting to come online for tanks.
Maybe, but that should apply to small powers that can be attacked.
A nuclear superpower should be in a position where nobody would dare attack its airbases. Because everyone knows what the response would be.
And right now those of Russia are attacked daily, but I don't see that same happening to the NATO ones in Europe and the US...
Which is because they know Russia won't respond.
IF 4 were lost
IF it came from Estonia
IF it is a probing action
IF this, IF that, IF the dog didn't stop to take a s*it, it would have caught the rabbit.
It would be very clever of the Russians to keep mentioning the "drones from Estonia" angle. They should be very explicit about it and repeat the accusation every chance they get. In the end, Russia is going to have to confront Nato and Estonia is a natural target if Russia is going to avoid being denied access to the Baltic Sea.
Until they hang Zelensky.
Thanks for this
Looks like Ukraine is now reudced to using paper planes.....
Do they work in the rain?
Wouldn't you hate to be Zelensky?
Thank you !!
In today’s interview Tucker Carlson stated that he would bet his house that Biden bipartisan War clique will start hot war with Russia -- that they have no longer other choice against Trump but to use War Act
Tucker Carlson on His Interview with Trump, FOX Firing & America's Future
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q89Rzl9J5v4 --- Aug. 29 (1 hour)
I saw that earlier this evening. It was a good interview, disturbing and truthful on many levels, but a good interview. The crazies are in charge and it scares the hell out of me what they will do. Even worse is there is zero of anyone to be a leader in the wings, they are all part of "Permanent Washington" as Tucker calls it. They are senile, stupid and clueless, NWO freaks, or just lazy sacks of shit that will do whatever to keep their seat at the trough.
CIA/Nazis and Zionist Jews are the two leading parasites and predators to mankind. They have a natural alliance with Ukraine… bit a quick search of history will reveal genocide, culling of their own people (deplorable whites and ghetto Jews),mass genetic changing injections, and now transhumanism. All the money from the Jewish Banking Mafia and all the political might is not the end goal - creating their own Frankenstein population must be quite exhiliarating.
Tyndale -- your antisemitic emphasis is repulsive
Silence you WOKE fool. Zionist Jews are not semite and they are not even Hebrew.
do you know what a semite is?
do you know what a khazar is?
do you know that khazars are turks?
do you know that the israelis are khazars ie european "jews"?
do you know that semitic jews are the lowest social class in israel?
do you know that israel is conducting a genocide on the semites in palestine?
time to do some reading, mate.
I know very well to recognize ignorance and antisemitic lunacy and hatred. Take some medicine and get better soon.
Zionism is the opposite of Judaism, it's nazism's younger brother.
Judaism has its problems of hatred and desire to enslave other races... and parasitism. Not sure if that can be reformed.
Judaism isn't a race, it's a religion; ask Yaphet Kotto.
Haha. Lets just say Judaism filled a niche in society that is unacceptable to Sovereign Humans. Same can be said for Western oligarchs.
Thanks Crone -- and endlessly looting and looting...
Endless murder and displacement of people too.
Not sure how much I trust Tucker at this point. His main objection to the war against Russia is that it is not a war against China. He's pushing for a hot war, just not with Russia.
I don’t think you are correct -- clearly you didn’t listen to his interview
Yeah, he doesn't talk about China in this particular interview, but nearly everything else he does he promotes "muh Chinese are our mortal enemies." He promoted that utterly asinine "chinese spy balloon" nonsense. He constantly talks about how the current administration is "soft" on China when in reality the Biden admin has been the biggest anti-China hawks since, well, ever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PpYt37Zy4EU
Hes an American - what do you expect?
His rationale for making peace with Russia makes sense if you approach Americas rivalry with China from a strategic standpoint - end the war with Russia, give them Ukraine in return for concessions vis a vis China, who is currently the bigger threeat to the US anyways
Tucker Carlson is a propagandist for the MAGA/Trumptard wing of the American Empire, which favors war against China--as opposed to war against Russia. Carlson is the conservative doppelganger of Rachel Maddow, who is a propagandist for the Democrat/Libtard wing of the American Empire and favors the opposite.
The fact that this media clown is pimped by some people as an "antiwar" voice shows how militaristic America truly is.
There is no principled antiwar opposition of political significance in the USA. The only political distinctions in the US are debates about *which* country America should prepare to wage war against.
Thus, Donald Trump is always running his mouth about how he "didn't start any new wars," but he covers up how he escalated America's not-so-covert hybrid wars against Iran, Venezuela, China, or the proxy war against Russia in Syria.
Trump is just the White conservative version of Barack Obama, who disingenuously opposed the "dumb" US war against Iraq--only because he wanted to wage smart US wars against Libya, Syria, etc.
There are no "good guys" within the American corporate/political oligarchy, media, or national security state.
They are all war criminals.
They Dupe People Into Debating War With Russia Vs War With China, Instead Of War Itself
https://caityjohnstone.medium.com/they-dupe-people-into-debating-war-with-russia-vs-war-with-china-instead-of-war-itself-4c248a6db2c2
sometimes T.C. goes off the deep end.
he is a D.T. fan.
Excellent writeup.
Simplicius - can you comment on the Rabotino situation in a bit more detail? I know it is fluid, but Rabotino being "gray" zone vs. a temporary Ukraine presence vs. a partial Russian presence, etc is somewhat important. Also the talk about taking Tokmak.
As for mobilization: it is far from clear to me what good this would do. Unless the West empties out its armories even more - i.e. going into active reserve as opposed to inactive reserve or even less ready platforms - what exactly will these 200K, 300K, 500K additional Ukrainian soldiers have in terms of gear? AKs with a single clip each?
One of the reasons it's unclear is because Ukraine, as per their job, is doing a lot of deliberate smokescreen propaganda to confuse the issue as much as possible. They did the same in Staromayorsk and elsewhere where a small DRG team went in to hang a flag then retreated. They took a video of themselves hanging a flag in the center of Rabotino but quickly ran away. They hoped this would convince the world Rabotino is theirs, but Russian sources continue to deny that it's taken.
The fact is, it is "fluid" as you say. Meaning, on a daily basis they have troops that enter it then are hit with artillery and retreat. So depending on the time of day the answer is different but they certainly don't hold or occupy it. Also, Russian troops continue launching similar assaults from the south of it. They enter from the south, work their way up toward the middle, then retreat once UA starts shelling or launching recon/FPV drones, etc.
This is a tactic to keep both sides "on their toes", in a sense 'active defense', an attempt to keep the opposing side from trying to come into the town. Most maps don't show this because most maps simply give up on trying to depict 'gray zones' and only show colors for complete control so once Russia retreated they defaulted to showing Rabotino as mostly Ukrainian controlled colors.
Now it appears UA has taken so many losses trying to take Rabotino they gave up and are reorienting everything toward what they perceive as the Verbove "breakthrough".
Yes Tokmak has become their truncated goal, as I think I wrote in the last report. They've settled for that as being "good enough" since they now know Melitopol/Crimea is impossible.
Tokmak is technically not far away from Verbove area, a mere 20km+. However looks are a little deceiving because Ukraine can't just keep pushing a deep wedge/salient from Verbove down to Tokmak as they would be surrounded on all sides and have the walls of the salient collapsed in on them from the sides. So in order to get down there they have to keep flattening the contact line which means capturing huge amounts of new territory south of Rabotino parallel to the Verbove salient, including the main road there. This would be a huge undertaking that's fairly inconceivable at the moment.
As for mobilization, one of the themes of recent reports claims that after taking major equipment losses Ukraine has utilized more and more meat assaults in Rabotino where non-mechanized troops simply run along the tree/hedge lines with maybe 1 or 2 IFVs attempting to "cover" them. There's a few videos where you can actually see this, for instance most recently: https://www.bitchute.com/video/F77pL3BVFOnS/
So what I'm saying is that they could use that tactic more and more, just use motorized men without heavy equipment running to the position.
Also, they will likely dig into trenches during the winter as they mobilize and bank on the West supplying more light armor by next spring. It's true the West is emptying reserves of the good stuff but there is still alot of crappy IFV/ICV/APC/AFV/IMV in the world. There's probably still tons of things like M113, YPR-765, BMP-1s, various MRAPs, French Vab4x4, Finnish XA-180, British Warriors, and various things of that nature. Not to mention that Sweden still claims to be in process of 'opening a Cv-90 factory in Ukraine' which is probably some kind of weird posturing.
But just as an example, the official number of built MaxxPro MRAPS is over 9,000. That's not counting thousands of Turkish Kirpi, British Huskies, and various other Scandinavian knockoffs thereof. So just in the MRAP department they can likely supply Ukraine forever and at some point UA will probably have few tanks but tons of light vehicles of that sort and will be forced to conduct offensives on them.
As for small arms and various RPG type of things, the world has nearly infinite of those so I don't see them running out of any of that any time soon. The real bottleneck will be heavy armor like tanks and good artillery/MLRS systems most likely (and their ammo).
I've been thinking lately that those MaxxPro and MRAPS aren't that bad of an option as long as they stop the larger shell fragments. MBTs, and AFVs armor cant protect against most of the ATGMS and FPVs being used. The land mines demobilize everything, so cheaper vehicles that keep the passengers and crew protected from the inevitable mine hit is a reasonable option.
Yep, also the Humvee. The official number of Humvees built is, I kid you not, 250,000 according to Wiki. They can supply those til the end of time. And newer Humvees can come with an assortment of weapons from ATGM/TOW to manpads, etc.
Here's a recent assault of American/English-speaking mercenaries utilizing them: https://www.bitchute.com/video/VOEeTuDWrTGA/
I think they've been watching too many "Rat Patrol" re-runs.
Ah yes, the mixed mercenary (I hear 1 American, 1 British, 2 perhaps 3 Aussie and a possible Canadian voice in that group) doing kinetic (shoot and frag first, check later) trench clearing. Lots of 5.56 going off, no obvious AK fire, likely no-one home.... Wonder if they stayed for the Russian artillery fire, or jumped back in the hummers and back to the local spa???
I’m glad I’ve read your post because by now I’ve seen innumerable videos showing what you just describe: groups of lightly armed soldiers casually shooting (almost leisurely) tens of magazines into holes in the ground and I’ve been wondering how seriously can they be taken, o don’t imagine Russian soldiers (or any soldier) passively hiding in a shallow hole and not defend themselves vigorously.
History Legends had a recent video on this. He argues that the vehicles are [now] not used in attack pre se but to ferry troops to near a jump off line, where they attack on foot. So really any 4x4 wheeled AFV would work on rough roads and tracks.
The pro-Russian blogosphere is IMHO getting too stressed by the latest UAF advances. The fact that they are now (barely) through a defensive crumple zone - having taken c 50% losses - and are now meeting or even into part of the first line of defence - simply means the Russian plan is working. They would not build multiple lines of defence had they anticipated stopping the UAF in front of them. The UAF is simply advancing in two areas into narrow salients which form fire traps. They are now seeking to deepen and widen the salients at maybe a few hundred metres a day, taking ,massive losses to to so. This allows a PR victory - "we are advancing in difficult circumstances". It is not really material who controls a few villages. The metric is who has a functioning army come the end of September. The UAF is winning itself to death, to coin a comment from an earlier war in this area.
They are working hard at progressing to the south into a patiently waiting cauldron - poor devils won't have a chance.
Last Russian Ukraine war back in '14 or '15 there was a lot of talk about Cauldrons where the Ukies would advance only to find them surrounded and taking artillery from all sides. Last year this time there was a lot of talk about a "winter offensive." Now with no talk, I expect that is what will happen.
I agree with Simplicus that there is a lot of spare military kit in the world and certainly the UAF could mobilise these numbers of men into its ranks. There is probably enough assorted ammo too, but not the famed 155mm shells. I doubt the motivation of these latest press ganged troops, and their training is likely to be cursory. I know this sounds like the western media and expert clowns discussing Russian "conscripts". However I cannot see that the latest wave of cannon fodder will be remotely as effective as earlier ones. I have been surprised by the fortitude of the UAF soldiers pressing forward in the counter attacks. These men have shown courage. However the troops committed have been the UAF elite - its best trained, best equipped and best motivated soldiers. You cannot replace them quickly with youths fresh out of school and guys about to draw their pension - and who really do not want to die or become maimed.
I would expect Russia to maintain or up the tempo and scale of the fighting so as to grind down the UAF and not give it chance to recover. The latest UAF conscripts will be forced to battle before being trained or equipped properly and will suffer accordingly. It is quite sickening really. But war is war.
Their best alternative is to quickly surrender - and I suspect many will do just that.
I am sure that the Ukrainians will employ blocking units to prevent precisely that.
If they are light on armor they will be chewed up by cluster bombs now that both sides are using them. I think they are more effective against infantry than the people are admitting due to international disapproval.
Then the next stage of this conflict will be cheap-as-fuck paper anti-personnel loitering drones.
And when THOSE are put into 'civilian' service, that is pretty much the end for 'civilisation'. An assassin drone for $50? Easily constructed, only bottleneck explosives. Not difficult for organised crime, pissed off American patriots, and likely farmers angry at Big Ag/Banksters.
Undetectable. Unstoppable unless you live in a bunker.
These morons just couldn't stop. Couldn't say "We've got enough, now lets share it". Couldn't stop their mad dreams of "conquest".
They're idiots, imbeciles.
Orwell knew them from the war rooms. He wrote true.
I remember after 911 Bush wanted to monitor model aircraft enthusiasts as possible terrorists. Guess he was just 20 years early.
Thank you for the long and detailed reply.
Rabotino - what you describe is what my immediate reaction was: more Twitter Warrior-ing. MoonOfAlabama and BigSerge also noted that the parts that Ukraine have been advancing are lowlands compared to the areas the Russian troops still occupy - so "advances" are just more meatgrinding under ISR vectored artillery/mortar/missile/RPG fire.
Re; IFVs/AFVs
You make an excellent point on the numbers of AFVs/IFVs available and their use as fast battlefield/"not die from the first mine" transport.
However, how well do these vehicles stand up under drone, artillery or even RPG fire?
Also, what would the situation be if Russia really started an offensive including use of actual tanks? Does Ukraine have sufficent anti-armor or sufficiently heavily gunned AFVs/IFVs to have a serious chance of taking down T90s or other late gen tanks? Or the later twin-warhead RPG types?
As you note - there are almost certainly enough small arms but these "new" tactics - which are really just the stereotypical "Polish mine detector" joke in action, probably the joke will get renamed - again, it isn't clear to me that Ukrainian society will continue to accept massive casualties. If the choice is between death by Russian fire/mines/artillery vs. Death By SBU in rebelling against the Ukrainian regime - at least you can do the latter from home. It seems improbable that everyone in Ukraine does not know just how bad the military situation is despite historic levels of agitprop.
The trouble with tanks are they travel on ground and the ground is covered with mines. Anti-tank and Manpads both hand carried; the small groups heavily armed. For an offensive, I'm thinking heavily armed airborne troops and using the roads and bridges they left standing. You also notice in the videos some really big thermobaric missile hits, and some smaller drone hits. Expect more thermobaric hits. Against light armored groups like the Ukies are throwing the Russ, clusters bombs and artillery shells should clear wide swaths of forest, and I think Russ has an advantage with these. But I would rather take out the government rather than kill the 70 year old ex-school teachers they are drafting.
Agreed, there are mines and antitank. Manpads are for aircraft.
The question is: how many does Ukraine have? The disproportionate military industrial capacity Russia has shown vs. both Ukraine and the West certainly applies to mines as well.
The other thing is Russian tanks are far more mobile over rough terrain - due to lighter weight and desire objective - than Western equivalents. Not saying the Russian tanks are traipsing about like Humvees, but they are certainly far less restricted to roads than the Western stuff.
thank you so much for delightful ending - Prigozhin - my favorite Russian Character of all time -
I hope he's not dead.
"Ukraine doesn't release its number of war casualties — at this cemetery, the real toll is on show"
Don't see this much in the MSM. Still not calling for peace talks though. Obviously not enough pain yet.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-30/russia-ukraine-war-krasnopilske-cemetery-show-invasion-toll/102734276
That Ukrainians are dying in droves does not affect the lives of the decisionmakers in Washington, or even the lives of their local satraps in Kiev one bit.
Another fine report as usual. Russian drones are causing so much more damage than Ukie drones, there's really no comparison, especially in the front line region. The small mostly silent grenade droppers are the worst. Every squad needs to have at least one drone guard/lookout on constant alert. And if you have a vehicle of any sort anywhere near the FEBA, you should anticipate being attacked by a drone. And drone density on the FEBA will only increase given their effectiveness. Even those cardboard drones are killers. The Donestk weather forecast for September looks good with little rain allowing for mobile warfare if Russia so decides. Rabotino looks like a caldron in the making.
Russia needs to step up its infrastructure attacks in the west of pookraine before winter, give the poles a few million more welfare recipients to support.
It also needs to arrange an accident for that italian ship if that was involved in the airport attacks, and then say "it wasnt us". Also, send wagners one by one on a european tour and arrange lots of accidental fires/explosions.
They should try to take out rail/road bridges, electrical stations, power generation plants, rail junctions, railheads, marshalling yards, airports systematically and all over the country. and keep hitting them repeatedly.
Hi! Long time reader, first time commenter. If I may ask a question... Col. Douglas McGregor puts Ukrainian manpower losses at 400k dead. How do you feel about that number, what would be your number, and how confident do you feel about that number?
It gets into the weeds of a lot of nuances of what do you consider losses. For instance, many people blanketly call "casualties" as anything including KIA/WIA/POW, etc.
If you very strictly mean killed in action only, it can be one number, but that wouldn't tell the whole story because there are also "irrecoverable losses" which are MIA/POW and WIA which are maimed with lost limbs, etc., such that they can't return to combat, which means they're no different than killed in action since they're out of combat permanently.
So if we say, how many total "irrecoverable losses" does Ukraine have, which would mean both KIA, MIA, POW, and also maimed and limbless to the point of not being able to fight any more. Here's my thinking on it:
There have been multiple specific leaks just on the maimed alone which have shown over 60k and that was long ago. In fact, in one of my recent reports I showed an actual Western MSM source that said 60k+ without limbs. That means they can't fight ever again.
Then, recall that Prigozhin is believed by some to be a "too honest" person to a fault. He admitted Wagner allegedly had 20k casualties in Bakhmut, but he said that they took over 60k dead Ukrainians with them. For the sake of argument, if we take him at his word, that means 60k dead Ukrainians just in Bakhmut alone. Add the 60k limbless/maimed that's 120k "irrecoverable losses" so far.
If we add many other meat grinders like Popasna, Lisichansk/Severodonetsk, Mariupol, etc., we get alot more. For instance, Mariupol is known to definitively have had a 15-20k garrison of AFU.
We know for a fact 4500-5000 of them were captured because there were 2500 captured in Azovstal confirmed, and another ~2000 at the Peter Ilich factory. Most of the remainder were liquidated. So Mariupol alone had at least 10-15k Ukrainian losses, if you give slight margin of error for escapees.
Without going into detail of every little battlefield otherwise, I would say that putting these together we'd have to say there's at least 150k irrecoverable losses which are the same as KIA but as high as 200-250k. This counts MIA/POW. Then just "wounded" there could be another 300-400k but many/most of those return to combat so it doesn't really matter counting them.
Recall one thing I said in some of my reports. KIA to POW is typically a given static ratio. For instance, just like WIA to KIA is usually anywhere from 3:1 to 5:1, POW:KIA is also a given ratio.
My point is that, in terms of KIA/casualties much of it is speculation, but POW is the only category where we actually have some confirmed numbers from BOTH sides, which is a very rare and critical thing. We have definitive evidence, which I've documented before in detail, that Russia at one point had 12-15k POWs of Ukrainian soldiers while Ukraine at the same time had about 2500 of Russian, give or take. If we take this same ratio and apply it to KIA or "irrecoverable losses", and if we use Russian KIA/irrecoverable to be somewhere in the 50-60k range (combining all Russian allied forces, LDPR, paramilitary, PMC, volunteer, etc.) that means Ukraine would have to have (12-15k/2500 = 5-7 ratio) 50-60k x 5-7 = 250-350k irrecoverable losses.
And this actually matches other sources which follow AFU losses with highly developed algorithms/methodologies such as https://wartears.org/ which currently has AFU at around 250k dead: https://i.imgur.com/j18cPkL.jpg
So I would say in terms of actual dead and underground it could be around 150k then if you count limbless/maimed and irrecoverable it could be 250k+ or even more.
Btw here's citation for MSM press showing upwards of 50k maimed limbs: https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-ukraine-a-surge-in-amputations-reveals-the-human-cost-of-russias-war-d0bca320
However, this is undercounted subtle "conditioning" from MSM because this is a recent article but already from late last year we had "leaks" from the AFU that they had 60k limbless. Which would mean by now it's far more than that.
That is about my take too, using a different methodology.
Something to add to the mix here is the degradation of rapid transport to/from the "grey zone" where most casualties occur.
On the Russian side, we have Minister Shoigu stating a wounded Russian soldier is at the aid post in 10 minutes, and the nearest M.A.S.H equivalent inside one hour (the "Golden Hour" critical to survival).
How does Ukraine fare in that regard?? It seems not well. There was video on Telegram recently of a Female Ukraine soldier, with both legs amputated at the knee. There was matching helmet-cam from her POV from when she stepped on the mine. In the few frames of the aftermath, her lower legs didn't look badly damaged (i.e. not completely blown off, but obviously with shrapnel). Her squad obviously applied tourniquets to suppress bleeding, but equally obvious is the failure to get her to quality medical care within the hour necessary to save her lower limbs.
Whether this is because such care is too far away, too overwhelmed with casualties (Has the Ukraine reached the point of hacking off limbs, ala the American Civil War, to save lives, because saving limbs requires resources they no longer have??) or simply exhausted from attrition, is hard to guess.
Casualties still occur at the 3:1 rate in the field, but one of the 3 bleeds out before getting to care, bringing the ratio to 2:2, i.e. 1:1 which some think is closer to Ukrainian reality, and these just get left where they fell, staying on their battalion books, drawing pay, which goes straight to the chain of command.
The lesser wounded go into indifferent or overwhelmed medical care, to become some other statistic.
In this light 250k dead to this point is wishful thinking (probably a barely pre Bakhmut number), 400k is near certainly an undercount and 500k the likely minimum.
We won't truly know until this is over, and farmers stop finding bodies to count when they plough their fields.
I am very curious to see how things pan out in Robatino. They must truly believe they are on the verge of a breakthrough and that they have attrited Ru forces significantly. Otherwise this makes no sense.
US media is very big on covering statements like “Robotino has fallen! To Ukraine” and “Next stop - the sea of Azoc”, and very small on showing maps that put the distances and the size of these major conquered “towns” in perspective. We are to believe they will chop their way to the coast meter by meter and that the flanks will guard themselves.
Also, Russia is out of manpower and unable to reinforce or rotate troops so as soon as the front line is breached it will be clear sailing all the way to Moscow!
“If you’re next to an airbase for instance, you can fly an FPV drone from the fence outside of the base right onto a plane and blow it up then leave by car long before authorities have figured out what even happened.”
You mean that security could be so lax around an air base, that one could just drive up next to its fence, fly a drone into an airplane on the base, and leisurely drive away without even being noticed? Lol, I don’t think I could even drive into the parking lot of a McDonald’s restaurant anywhere in the US without being noticed in a moment or recorded on camera!
Well, keep in mind this has happened so rarely that I think it shows it's not quite as easy as it sounds. But I guess from a 'relatively speaking' perspective it's a easy way to *attempt* to do a strike.
It's greatly exacerbated by virtue of this being a "brother war" where both sides look and talk alike. If this was U.S. in Iraq for instance it wouldn't fly because an Iraqi loitering near the edge of the base would be an immediate suspicion. But because Ukraine/Russians are so alike it creates opportunities for infinite types of sabotage.
There were blue on blue attacks.
They did that in Iraq all the time, hit and run guerrilla stuff. It is amazing the stuff people can do right in front of your face and you never see it until it is too late.
Is it possible that the US is behind the coups in Africa?
But, we might ask, why would they do something that harms their ally, France? Well, we could ask the same question about the Nordstream pipelines and the harm that their demolition caused Germany. In both cases, they cut off Germany/France from needed resources (including energy), weakened their position as independent powers, rendered them more dependent on the US, thereby ensuring that their vassal status to the US empire will continue into the future. Add to that the depletion of weaponry sent to Ukraine, and the mass hysteria over the "Russia threat" that Europeans have been subjected to, and we end up with a thoroughly captured Europe who will do whatever the US demands...including getting in a trade/sanctions skirmish with China.
They might also be trying to lure Russia and/or China into a conflict in Africa, where the US can more readily project power. The Ukraine war shows that Russia cannot be beaten in its own neighborhood, while simulations suggest that China would readily defeat the US in a confrontation in the west Pacific. So the only way the US can challenge them is to draw them outside of their comfort zones, and Africa would make a perfect candidate. China has made inroads into Africa, and has big plans. Russia, too. So they have something to fight for...but it isn't clear that they will take the bait.
Anyways maybe a possibility...
You could have a point. For instance, when the Sudan coup occured, many believed it to be pro-Russian since the rapid response forces had connections to Russia/Wagner. However, it also became known that U.S. was cultivating them as well.
Ultimately I don't think anything is black and white and most politicians/factions/movements try to hedge their bets or at least be "open" to various actors/state powers so it's definitely possible they can be playing both sides to an extent and trying to see who offers them more. For instance I already wrote about how the junta in Niger was not necessarily as it seems since the leader they overthrew was already anti-French colonialist. So I think what you're saying definitely has merit as things are much more complicated and nuanced than they seem.
With that said, if U.S. gains power at Europe's expense, that still somewhat suits Russia. Russia doesn't mind a powerful U.S. As long as Europe gets extremely weak then Russia will dominate them or at least have no fear of them. It's better for Russia to have just U.S. be powerful rather than both U.S. and Europe powerful, with Europe being used as a pitbull against Russia right on its doorstep.
Completely agree. So far the over-arching big picture geopolitical strategy of the US appears to be exactly similar to what it was in the cold war: isolation, economic war, proxy conflicts around the world, and ultimately aiming for revolution inside Russia. Russia is more confident this time because it is in a much better position than 1945, has better leverage in the global economy, a strong relationship with China, and BRICS+ is icing on the cake. The US, on the other hand, is in a terrible state that can only be papered over for so long by funny money (as opposed to post-WW2, when it was the only major industrial power that had not been destroyed).
I don't think we are in a better position than in 1945, at least in terms of army. Soviet army in 1945 was without any questions most experienced, battle hardened and adequately equipped in the world. The Soviets annihilated ~1mln Japanese army in about a month with only a fraction of their forces diverted from the eastern parts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_invasion_of_Manchuria
The US is not falling apart, it has its problems but it’s hardly Rome in 450 AD.
All that is happening is Russia is returning to its rightful place in the pecking order after 30 years of momentary loss of place.
The same happened to China for 100 years.
Agreed except that a weak Europe is not necessarily a benefit to the US power projection. Vassals need to be subservient but not weak otherwise they aren’t as useful as a bulwark against your adversaries, and if they don’t have some level of self sufficiency they can be a drag on your resources. Not to mention that if the reason for the weakness of the vassal is the hegemon itself, sooner rather than later chaos ensues and the vassal starts to align themselves with powers that help stabilize them instead.
I think if some of the actions we are seeing in Africa is due to a combination of:
1) General corruption in Africa. Not the first time
2) Russia and China support
3) The US taking control from European powers
The third is not stemming from grand geopolitical game but simply acquisition regardless of the party on the other end. Think the sub deal with Australia. The US didn’t hesitate to take it away from France and the reaction was some angry words. That’s it.
I would also like to point out the difference between France and Germany. Germany is completely vassalized and under the thumb of the US (same with Japan but slightly less in Japan). France due to its culture of rebellion and skepticism and, at least until recently, independent education system and freer media, are harder to control. Point being, Nordstream was the US acting with impunity against Germany, while the Australian sub deal and Africa goings on are an attempt to cut France to size and gaining leverage against it.
Complex but straightforward.
Interesting! Makes sense.
Yes smo is slow, not just because as simplicius mentioned, and it's nazi ideology but the military training its under going.
Obama and Medvedev have a cozy relationship. And I have seen a possibility open that US and Russians are working together...i mean come on, no sincere leader would genocide his population. The Russians will show up on US soil to defeat the whatever resistance we garner over here to reestablish the republic. I thought, as did Britain fear back in the 1850s that a Russian and US alliance could rule the world. Well the bastards have it at thier feet now and we will be in the 1000yr whatever, maybe we should side with Belgium and eat Z bugs and be like Renfield.
So they flew a swarm of ~20 drones for 600km over Russian territory at ~100ft altitude and nobody heard them flying over?
That theory is definitely questionable, which is why some believe they came from Estonia. With that said you have to remember this happened in the middle of the night when the country is sleeping, and the route would have likely programmed the drones to circumvent all major city centers (where powerful AD systems would typically be stationed anyway) and instead fly over rural regions. Open up your google maps and click satellite mode on the "layers" then follow along from Sumy/Chernigov to east of Smolensk. There's nothing but farms and open ground with a few tiny settlements. Now imagine flying over all that at 3am in the morning on a cardboard drone that probably doesn't make much noise--it could be possible, but we don't know for sure how it was done. For all we know, they had saboteurs who drove the disassembled drones in a car to the area, assembled them nearby (particularly if they're the cardboard variety) and then launched them from right near the base.
That doesn’t solve the range issue though - the cardboard drones can’t travel 600km.
Also I'd like to point out that when Ukraine used the Bober/Beaver drones on Moscow, there were several videos of people who "heard" the propeller/engine noise of the drone and began to film them flying at low ~100ft altitude. You can still look up and find these videos from the outskirts of Moscow.
But what's interesting to me is, this was a rare case when they struck during the day so many people were out and about and heard the drones. However it's interesting that they only "heard" them when they were right on the outskirts of Moscow. Moscow has a much larger outlying area that's still "urbanized" rather than rural, where tons of people live, for instance down to Kaluga etc.
So this raises a very big question: why didn't people during the daylight hour "hear" these propeller drones farther out like near Kaluga, etc. Why did they only begin to hear and film them en masse much closer to Moscow? It almost seems to suggest that the drones are not actually flying from Ukraine but are in fact being launched from somewhere "nearby".
East Palo Alto has had audible-gunshot detectors (distributed array to determine location). Such could be used.
Given the work on the Penicillin, you'd think applying that to annoying drone engines would be an obvious solution. But you're back to the "not enough systems" problem, which means you need a very-Russian solution "how to make Penicillin really cheap if it doesn't need to move". I think it ends up being similar to how Serbia used tv antennas to track F117s.